I was working on this prompt & having considerable writer's block, so I closed my eyes and started letting my pen trail along on the paper however it wanted to. What I ended up with was a really circuitous track that made me think of the shoreline of a reservoir wherever there is a lot of surrounding topography. And in particular, a lake in the Sierra Nevada I visited a couple months ago. I'm calling this "How a Few Small Tarns Became Lake Aloha."
Eek, I am not a fan of centipedes, but I’ve been sharing space with them in an old farmhouse for about 18 years now, and the scary/creepy/heebyjeeby factor has definitely softened with time. Maybe that’s how it is with darkness, too.
This poem is such a beautiful exploration of edge spaces, Larry, and of the apparent tension between light and dark (that maybe isn't really a tension at all). 🧡
Thank you Lisa! I sense you are right: what we often describe as a tension between two things like light and dark may better be termed a dance, a complementary rhythm finding its way into being!
This is a remarkable poem, Lisa. You capture the small, medium and big parts of life so well, so vividly, so abstractly, so beautifully. Facing our shadows, our darkness, is such a challenge for so many, including me, but honoring that it is there, that it is a part of me, can also be a path to wholeness, release and freedom. Happy Thanksgiving and season of gratitide, friend!
My brain is very scattered at the moment, but I LOVE this poem.
Thank you so much, dear! Hugs to you and your brain. ❤️
Loved the dark. Felt at peace.
🖤🖤🖤
LOVE this🖤
Thank you, Rick!
I was working on this prompt & having considerable writer's block, so I closed my eyes and started letting my pen trail along on the paper however it wanted to. What I ended up with was a really circuitous track that made me think of the shoreline of a reservoir wherever there is a lot of surrounding topography. And in particular, a lake in the Sierra Nevada I visited a couple months ago. I'm calling this "How a Few Small Tarns Became Lake Aloha."
.
If I build a low wall
for the parts of me
that run away, I will grow
right here,
stretching my fingers
into the canyons.
I will set myself down
like lines on a page,
wandering into my own
blank spaces, coming
into view.
.
I will crisscross
the granite,
fill your pot,
soak your boots.
.
I was always
this much water.
This is beautiful! I love you wrote it from the perspective of one particular lake - whether consciously or otherwise!
Squirming in darkness, maybe it's not so bad to confront the centipedes hiding there. Thanks for nudge!
Eek, I am not a fan of centipedes, but I’ve been sharing space with them in an old farmhouse for about 18 years now, and the scary/creepy/heebyjeeby factor has definitely softened with time. Maybe that’s how it is with darkness, too.
Lisa, your poem and prompt took me on a walk about--I am still wandering.
Edges
^
“What are your growing edges?”
The intuitive mystic asks;
And I reflect on growing, which feels good
And I wonder about the edge, which can feel—
Edgy.
^
That illusive unseen line between
Transformation and revelation
and falling off,
the mighty thud of impact,
or the desperate scream as the abyss opens up
and life is a memory scroll through
The Shutterfly album of my life.
^
These growing edges that give us the opportunity
to unfreeze, move out of numbness
into the dangerous ground of vulnerability.
^
Have I fallen off?
^
My romantic narrative of this life,
draws incessantly to the light,
poetic metaphor of hope and redemption;
Sweet symphony of change from red to green,
Love and light at the center of my all.
^But the voice is always there,
calling from the shadows
“Don’t forget about me.”
Sometimes a sweet, soft whisper,
others a craggy, ancient telegram
from a moon somewhere in this universe
of spurious fanfare.
Often a marching band plowing through my dream world,
ragged tune that sings
“We’ll find you, sooner or later…
Or wait for you at journey’s end.”
^
These complex shadows of grey and grain,
too long avoided, until
at that growing edge,
all is clear.
My shadows and light are one.
This poem is such a beautiful exploration of edge spaces, Larry, and of the apparent tension between light and dark (that maybe isn't really a tension at all). 🧡
Thank you Lisa! I sense you are right: what we often describe as a tension between two things like light and dark may better be termed a dance, a complementary rhythm finding its way into being!
This is a remarkable poem, Lisa. You capture the small, medium and big parts of life so well, so vividly, so abstractly, so beautifully. Facing our shadows, our darkness, is such a challenge for so many, including me, but honoring that it is there, that it is a part of me, can also be a path to wholeness, release and freedom. Happy Thanksgiving and season of gratitide, friend!
Thank you for your kind words, friend, and happy Thanksgiving to you! Wholeness feels like a perfect word to use here.
Thank you Lisa for inspiring wholeness!