I. On his nineteen years
These days are sadly sweet with much to-do;
I shape my share of thought, to share with few.
I speak with salience, saying what is true,
But all I say is not all that is true.
So with the mind and mouth, so with my make;
I'd fain to move and mold as I would take.
II. To his family and one he did not know well
A man and lady follow for the one;
They follow still, and nineteen years are done.
I am that one, a being grown but limp;
Who walks so high he often seems a simp.
A couple never known to me in face
Gave rise to one I knew in time and place.
I trust they followed her, as did we all;
But no one finds her now, because of fall.
We say we knew her, but not known too well.
The autumn leaves refused to bear her tale.
Her name is set in stone and not the wind,
And I see newborn spots upon my skin.
III. In the fields, chasing the eclipse
Assorted people felt me out this day;
As I was sought, I sought to push away:
Away I went to shapely darkened fields
To watch the moon disclose her waxing yields.
I knelt and lay in close on cooling earth,
An unseen shadow raised from evening birth.
I brought a song to sing of moons and knights,
And dreamt of dancing with the lunar light.
The harvest moon with fullness in the sky
Eludes description though it hits the eye:
No redder ruddy reddish reddened red
Was surely dreamt, but how comes light from dread?
I let my thoughts be raped while lying still
Upon a shade of green which darkness killed.
September 1996
I wrote this around my nineteenth birthday. The title describes exactly when. I had learned recently that an acquaintance of mine from high school died in a motorcycle accident. She was the first person from my senior class to die (one student had committed suicide a year before graduation). She was so bright and alive. Her life had yet to begin and shine, and now it was done. I collected my thoughts and composed this piece. I've left intact the grammatical oddity of the question in the penultimate stanza, but I've changed two words for clarity's sake.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
7 comments:
Sadness of death of girl have you, or fear of impending death own your do? Perish all we will, but make most of time we have must be!
Time out in world must predominate. Release from lure of intranet. Only briefly visit we do. Most of time you should forget me, and I you. Poem shows life is too short.
This is a most quixotic relationship we have here. How can I forget you when I don't know who it is I should be forgetting?
Her death did not sadden me then, because I never knew her that well, but it made me pensive. My heart is bigger now, and today her death saddens me a little more.
I feared death more back then. The prospect of nothingness horrified me. Things have changed since then, and especially since Sept. 11, 2001. But that's a whole other story that we don't have space for here.
You know that I am a community organizer and spend a lot of time in the world. This blog creates an important spiritual space where I can come away for a while. It is a place of rest, even sabbath. Your presence here is always welcome.
Have you written reflective poem regarding 9/11?
No, I have not. But I have written about 9/11 in other ways, and it did affect the way I write creatively. I also have journal entries from that time.
Sept. 11 is personal to me because I worked in Manhattan and people from my office died in the World Trade Center. And had I gone to the breakfast conference my co-workers attended, I would be lost, too. To put that in the form of a song or poem ... I don't know. That would be some challenge.
It may take some time to be up to such a challenge.
The time may come one day. If and when the moment comes, I will be ready.
Post a Comment