Describe in poem each lively soul’s dance toward infinity. If you feel comfortable, leave your work or a link to it below in the comments section. (Please do not send your work or links to me by email or through Facebook message.) All poems in response to this theme will be published here next Tuesday. All are welcome no matter the status of your career: beginning, emerging or pro. You have until 8:30 pm PST, Monday, January 22. Thank you!
There are open spaces in the plotting of a story
I print out for edit during one of my work hours
In the silence of creativity, a lavender plant
lends its fragrance and color, painting a calm
Outside squirrels scamper, toddlers play and
their grandmothers stand-watch in doorways,
chili stewing and stacks of tortillas, warm and
soft, rest and wait under clean kitchen towels
Spring is moving into summer and neighbors
tend their herb and vegetable gardens
They imagine the yield dressed in salads
They’re willing to share the harvest with friends
A world away soldiers download ordnance,
synchronized to the hum and click of my printer
Bodies fall, hearts stop, mother-tears water
my manuscript, blue-pencilled by rifle fire
“In the midway of this our mortal life, I found me in a gloomy wood, astray…”
Inferno Canto 1, Durante (Dante) degli Alighieri
in a mood
he stood at the wood’s edge and thought
……….why?
lost
this pained walk
under dark skies
living on the verge
wondering if he was
the plaything of his Lord, if so
a cruel game
from somewhere brightness beckoned
on the wing beat of sudden insight ~
it’s not your memory melting in the heat of time
or your true music dissolving unsung
nor the whimsy of some capricious god
it is, perhaps, Dante’s transformative hell
no love without yearning
no compassion without pain
no charity without failure
a Moses, he fell before the flaming bush
A Phoenix, he rose from the ashes
in his found humanity, he embraced life whole
There are moments, sometimes light and sometimes dark, that are transformative. Tell us about that in a poem and if you feel comfortable share or a link to it in the comments below. All shared work on theme will be published here next Tuesday, January 9. All are invited to participate no matter the status of your career: beginning, emerging or pro. Deadline is Monday, January 15 at 8:30 pm PST.
Jamie Dedes' THE POET BY DAY Webzine 