Gradually and Then Suddenly
Poem + Prompt
I am trying something new—lying in bed on my good side, laptop perched on the edge of the mattress, bluetooth keyboard angled across my hip, typing mostly one-handed. I cannot recommend this from an efficiency standpoint, but if ever you find yourself largely bedbound by nerve pain, give it a try. Given the circumstances, today’s post will include minimal exposition, but I plucked out a poem on my phone yesterday while lounging here on my left side, and I wanted to share it—and this strange, gutting social and political moment we find ourselves in—with you.
Gradually and Then Suddenly
Gradually and then suddenly, storm billowed in my neck, streaked lightning down my arm. Gradually and then suddenly, the voltage rose. I fell unconscious on the bathroom floor. Gradually and then suddenly, life raveled to a loose tuck of blanket. I am a body in a bed. Gradually and then suddenly, ICE sluiced the streets. The poet’s car became her coffin. Gradually and then suddenly, words became weapons became war. Pain begets pain begets pain begets submission or else, gradually and then suddenly, a neck turns into the blaze, feet take to slickened streets, the body knows what the head cannot— how gradually and then suddenly, anything can burn or quicken and rise.
The Prompt
I don’t have it in me to type much today, but if you’re looking for a prompt to play with, then here are two offerings to choose from: 1) Take the phrase “gradually then suddenly” and use it as the starting point for a poem of your own. Or 2) Go check out my responses to Jane Ratcliffe’s “The Body, Brain, and Books” questionnaire. Contemplate your own answers to the same questions. Let one of them be the prompt for your next poem.
As always, I’d be delighted to read your poems, reflections, or comments! Thank you for being here.
You've dramatically and effectively linked the personal and universal with this poem, Lisa.
Well done.
Hoping you've hit the plateau that precedes the decline; and that you're gradually approaching the turning point to sudden healing.
I grabbed the first question you answered and that became my poem :).
What are you reading now?
.
It’s a question my husband asks me once a week or so
knowing that I cycle through books like a dishwasher.
I’m always reading a few at once. Thrillers, rom-coms, poetry.
I try to be good and throw in some nonfiction every few weeks
and of course those are the ones that change my life.
.
But tonight, as we make dinner, I ask him a question. We sometimes read
the same books, not often, but if the other person raves about them.
I started one of his most beloved, and at a quarter way through
I had to ask him a question: “Is there a happy ending for these characters?
Do they get what they want?” The answer was no. No,
and they become ghosts, restless and dissatisfied even in death.
.
I tell him, “I don’t think I can finish this book. I’m already so sad
and everything around me feels sad. This book feels like a pill
I make myself swallow each day. It’s good for me—“
.
and here he asks, “Is it?” Closing the refrigerator door
and turning back to me, seeing how close I am to crying,
He holds me and asks, “Is it?”
.
I guess it’s not.
So I wash my hands
and close the book.
I feel a little lighter.