I am six. In the corner of the big playground a big bolder casts a patch of shade at recess. It's my favorite spot. Hidden from teeter-tottering friends, I crouch in white sandals, close my eyes, and smell the coolness of the rock above me. My fingers write secret messages in the sand and build walls out of thin rocks. With Mrs. Johnson's magnifying glass I watch an ant carry a grain of sand around the rock blockade.
I am nine. The cool girls are skating backward down the street. I sit beside my mailbox, my feet heavy with roller skates. I part the smooth gravel and bury my thin fingers into the cool, damp soil there. I grin as the roly-polies recoil.
I am 17. From above I watch myself walking shoulder-to-shoulder with jocks, gangsters, preps, geeks. I'm in but not of, clutching my thin notebook--my words--to my empty chest.
I am 39. So quiet in this empty house that I can hear the pilot light burning. In the thin light of winter, I write secret messages in pixels, while the cool girls click and clack under fluorescent lights a million miles away. My chest is full.
alone
always
I am most
me
Beautiful... When I read work like this I am more convinced than ever that remembering our past (as and for what it was/is) enables us to drink ever deeper of this moment 'now', knowing that in time 'here, now' will become back then.
ReplyDelete'the thin light of winter' Priceless!
Paul, thanks for stopping by, and thank you for such a beautiful insight. It's true: If we live in the now, "back then" will always make sense in the end.
ReplyDeleteI loved this; the flashes of vivid imagery --the moments-- tell a full story collectively. I like that you ended it with "my chest is full" and "alone always I am most me" -- I say, if you can't stand yourself, who can? I enjoy being alone myself -- sometimes a bit too much!
ReplyDeleteHelena, thank you for the kind comments. May not be the same for all, but learning to be alone was an easy lesson for me! xoxo
ReplyDeleteSo Angie... Feel like I'm taking a weekend retreat. Immersed in your words. Attuned to them somehow. It's lovely.
ReplyDeleteAnd so, did you know? These words? That you RT'd where yours? for you:
RT @myearthgirl: @Josepf: she knows I'm writing/ just about her/ words, her words move me/ life, love, alone with chest full/ me, head in hands, moved (wow)
Because, there were/are. Line of "with chest full" right off this post...
Namaste _/|\_ to the power of your words and the essence of you.
It has been quite long since I read something so internal yet so vivid in its deliverance. Firm steps, stations even, boldly described from a proud distance that is kept NOT in the expense of emotion. And this is the divinity of this piece of writing , this poem.
ReplyDeleteThe past casts a shadow , brands a mark, shoots its footage and your presence in your writing, YOU yourself, stand fearless and with raised sleeves.
When a poem breathes like a part of the writer and that becomes evident to the reader, something meaningful is made.