There you are, such that the phenomenon
Of 'behind' a veil takes on a new slant.
You've redefined it for me in the juxtapositions
You carry, heavily, awkwardly, and some tenderly.
For 'behind' becomes 'out in front,' the evening drunkenness
Marries with the sober mess of another day
Creating one breathtaking yet somber step
In the choreography of this life, the life
You have surreptitiously invited me to witness.
Which of these veils lay, in their transparency,
Across your heart? How do you know
Your own heart when that which obscures lends
Its fashioning to nearly every breath you take?
What, in your own private ken, can take your breath away?
Why not let it be so even here, even now.
Regardless of what it could bring, what could
Be said of you, of the other. Melt, like the snows,
That brick of larder sheltered in the walk-in
Of the kitchen of your existence. Taste.
What is here. Taste. Join me in the life that is yours.
Join me in taking in the smells, the fragrances.
Yes, you may suffer immunity from those. Walk
Anew into your own life through my eyes,
Landing there in a freshness that is Timeless.
May these words beckon to you in the way
Your touch has softened something in me,
Even in your withholding. For touch is beyond
Flesh, includes flesh, is the origins of flesh,
Something more than the senses that sees, hears, and listens yet.
Hi Janice, In reading this, i imagine you standing in your kitchen over a pot of something....stirring and gazing into the vessel as deep intimate insights are born from the steam or warmth that rises to your attention. Sorry, if that sounds hokey!! but that's the image that came :)
ReplyDeleteI feel as I read, that I'm being guided through warm,silent,dimly lit chambers with different colored walls, no-one around, but definitely a non-human or more than human presence...maybe something like the spirit of an animal friend.
I sense your joy and clarity and reverence for every drop of your experience as you describe it...something beyond inner and outer...playing with "veils"
states of mind/heart, shifting perceptions, the sensuality of direct experience
Delicious!
Janice, what a beautiful contrast of light/heavy, love/hate, blind/all-seeing. "What is here. Taste. Join me in the life that is yours. / Join me in taking in the smells," sums it up for me. A beautiful story.
ReplyDeleteI really respect the riskiness of this poem--and so much of your poeming--that rises again and again to experiencing whatever-it-is right now and fully, in all cases and outcomes.
ReplyDelete"There you are, such that the phenomenon
Of 'behind' a veil takes on a new slant."
"Yes, you may suffer immunity from those. Walk
Anew into your own life through my eyes,
Landing there in a freshness that is Timeless."
I feel such vulnerability in these lines, in the last stanzas, such a breathtaking invitation. My heart yesses into this precipitously in places, sliding slowly in others, veils moving and going taut to guide the way.
Thanks for this, living it now, feeling seen and guided by this. This poem eases the unknowing walking in question mark patterns in the astral GPS and helps me pause from plan-brain stepping in and boxing everything up, figuring everything out, which never helps:
ReplyDelete"How do you know
Your own heart when that which obscures lends
Its fashioning to nearly every breath you take?
What, in your own private ken, can take your breath away?"
Reminds me, like Rumi's, of how contact and witness are within as well as without, available, accessible, required.