NASA's blue doorway
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Inaugural Prompt: Autumnal Equinox 2010 - A Doorway Into Balance
For this inaugural prompt of our creative time together, during this time of change to autumn, we are invited to write about balance: how is this time of year a doorway? Stand in a doorway to write the first words of your poem.
NASA's blue doorway
NASA's blue doorway
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Will you look at this Swiss Army doorway?
ReplyDeleteSo many travelers gain smart passage:
we people traverse out and in each day—
through their own slot fall posted messages—
the cat’s private stile ushers his surveys—
light enters through the panes of rumpled glass—
the small sight-hole transports our safety peeks
at what’s hidden behind opacity—
and what’s denied entry by several locks—
well, that door is some kind of magic, eh?
As though through glazed membranes today I walk—
aware—added and subtracted from space—
the spine of time divided into back-
bones—multiplied by thresholds, each place’s
smorgasbord, arrayed aromas presage
some natural confusion—now balanced
in a pause—in a doorway of presence.
DA
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteequinox: aquarium
ReplyDeletewhen the doorway becomes a gaping gulf
and i, upturned, go swimming down into the gully of
my life,
i swim past fish bellies
synchronously gliding,
my life an aquarium blue.
i don't know the names of the beings
whose arms sprinkle guidance daily—
i sense their immensity,
incomprehensible.
this aquarium, this room
seems to hold my world
but at the season's doorway,
i sense greater presence:
the expanse beyond
invisible glass
that contains, protects, constrains me.
perhaps the wheel of time—equinox and solstice—
marks out the equipoise of knowing this space and sensing beyond.
are these time's doorways into ocean?
Scooter Cascadia
Heading back to bed on the equinox
ReplyDeleteWith the light at my back,
slowly the black of your room
begins to take shape...
the curve of a curtain,
the slant of that lamp,
soft edge of your bed.
I wait, and watch, and wait,
as my midnight eyes adjust,
reluctant to rush to your side.
It's too soon for me to know
your apartment in the dark.
Then you give me a start,
rolling over with a charming murmur.
"A glass of water," I explain,
though I know you're not awake.
Spilled drink, skinned shins,
broken bric-a-brac —
there's little to be gained from
stumbling about in the dark.
Yet isn't that what we've been doing?
We hold tight to one another in the night,
hand to hip, nose to nape,
knee tucked neatly inside knee.
But what do you really know of me,
a mystery perhaps more dangerous
than I seem, looming
in this Victorian doorway.
Yet it's you, tiny you,
that I see as a threat,
a sighing silhouette guilty
of inexplicable crime:
trust, unearned, falls asleep
on my chest week after week.
My clothes, my keys,
I could just leave...
yet there you sleep and dream and breathe
with me upon your threshold.
I wait, and watch, and wait.
And at last, yes, I step
carefully, consciously, into your room,
unsure of my footing, unsure of the way,
but continuing to seek our equilibrium.
Our days grow shorter, my dear,
our year grows dark —
will you meet me completely
and still retain the faint outline of yourself?
NEW ENGLAND SEPTEMBER
ReplyDeletea yellow wash of goldenrods is nodding
flagging every untended field
with the sweet ache of summer's wane
i knew they were coming,
watched them swell and push and bud
then i forgot, got distracted
until suddenly i am a tiny toy boat
in a tossing sea of gold.
maybe they took their cue from the trees,
who, finished with chlorophyll,
are spitting the sun's fire anew,
an elaborate red wilding,
spirited thank you to helios.
still, even they were just following the swirl rush of wind
which has in turn been pulled up
by a song from the orange sunrise.
and it is quite possible that only happened
because the geese honked steadily south
in widening vees upon vees,
darkening the evening skies of the night before.
i don't know how all that motion hangs together,
this opening show.
but the deep root-plenishment days are coming -
and we get to arrive there dancing,humming,dizzy.
we arrive before our hearts
which are taking the long way round,
stepping through a protracted ritual of light
in the gateway circus of autumn.
Now
ReplyDeleteThink of how the moon bride waits
behind her drifting fog veil.
Think of how the dark hawk floats
on the cold breeze of dawn.
Think of how each moment
marks a vestibule
opening into the remainder
of your astonishing life
yet also spelling the sorry, sad end
of your life up to this instant.
Entrance and exit.
Graduation, goodbye.
No easy task, to live
ever on the threshold
of some new and
terrifying light.
better than anything
ReplyDeleteI finally made it to that door
the door that was there all along
the door that’s not even a door
the door into the density ~
this door opens easily
but getting to it is a whole other story
It was as if there were leagues
of vast nothingness to cross, but instead
it was simply more than I could bear;
a weight keeping me from going anywhere
anchoring me from the inside,
a weight both hallowed and unnameable
Only to shift, this grey fierceness,
and without warning
cloaking something else, some other
terrain where my life travels and must...
taking hold like a fever, startling
the viscera, lighting the pit of the stomach
Something about it that begs for
seeing into but also waves off any
interest, too mild friendliness ~
it says, 'only speak to me if you can stand
the most tender part of you becoming
alight, awake, and awed in agitation'
When that is so, the door opens ~
or dissolves ~ all on its own, the fervor
calls out the very substance of its
undoing, no show, no thanks, especially
no trace leaving the unembellished,
that, which is better than anything