Two For Now
Jan. 4th, 2011 12:32 amThe first one stopped me in my tracks in a crowded room; the second gave me shivers. I don't know if I'm getting more sensitive or if they're getting better. Either way:
Why They Went
that men might learn what the world is like at the spot where the sun does not decline in the heavens.
—Apsley Cherry-Garrard
Frost bitten. Snow blind. Hungry. Craving
fresh pie and hot toddies, a whole roasted
unflippered thing to carve. Craving a bed
that had, an hour before entering,
been warmed with a stone from the hearth.
Always back to Eden—to the time when we knew
with certainty that something watched and loved us.
That the very air was miraculous and ours.
That all we had to do was show up.
The sun rolled along the horizon. The light never left them.
The air from their warm mouths became diamonds.
And they longed for everything they did not have.
And they came home and longed again.
Elizabeth Bradfield
This Poetry
It is where she has gone. A spoon clicks
in her mouth while her eyes fall back,
& the one holding her hand is not me
or you. It is a boy, her brother, & he is afraid,
though he remembers something about pressing
a spoon to her tongue so that metal catches
the flesh, so that the tongue does not follow
the eyes into leaving a part of this world.
Years later, this boy will read he was wrong
for using a spoon. He will spend the summer
lifeguarding at a pool, & more than once, he will
hold a body while it seizes in waist-high water.
Each one returns the same way, a pause & then
their life, all they have ever known, rushing back
into the mind. Forget the boy in the beginning.
He has grown into someone who spends too much
time remembering. For this, he has already lost a part
of himself, & from those people he saved, holding
them in the sun as they came to, the color in their eyes
sharp as glass, there was a time when he thought
this could be her, a body becoming weightless.
Then a stranger cried in his arms. She didn’t
know anyone around her, especially him.
It did not matter. This is not about remembering.
Forget there was ever a spoon. Forget the sound
metal makes against the teeth & the tongue.
Forget it all & come back to your life.
John Pineda
Today was really rough, at least most of it. I hauled myself out of bed and went to a yoga class with
estrellada's companionship and to fooding afterwards, and it helped. I haven't been to yoga in a number of years and this was not my favourite teaching method ever, but it served its purpose.
Almost ducked out of movie night due to feeling awful (perhaps the return to school/work weighing on me) but ended up going and getting lots of snuggles and good touching and remembering just how much I liked that movie, and getting fantastic pics of the babies. Glad to have gone. Now, bed.
Why They Went
that men might learn what the world is like at the spot where the sun does not decline in the heavens.
—Apsley Cherry-Garrard
Frost bitten. Snow blind. Hungry. Craving
fresh pie and hot toddies, a whole roasted
unflippered thing to carve. Craving a bed
that had, an hour before entering,
been warmed with a stone from the hearth.
Always back to Eden—to the time when we knew
with certainty that something watched and loved us.
That the very air was miraculous and ours.
That all we had to do was show up.
The sun rolled along the horizon. The light never left them.
The air from their warm mouths became diamonds.
And they longed for everything they did not have.
And they came home and longed again.
Elizabeth Bradfield
This Poetry
It is where she has gone. A spoon clicks
in her mouth while her eyes fall back,
& the one holding her hand is not me
or you. It is a boy, her brother, & he is afraid,
though he remembers something about pressing
a spoon to her tongue so that metal catches
the flesh, so that the tongue does not follow
the eyes into leaving a part of this world.
Years later, this boy will read he was wrong
for using a spoon. He will spend the summer
lifeguarding at a pool, & more than once, he will
hold a body while it seizes in waist-high water.
Each one returns the same way, a pause & then
their life, all they have ever known, rushing back
into the mind. Forget the boy in the beginning.
He has grown into someone who spends too much
time remembering. For this, he has already lost a part
of himself, & from those people he saved, holding
them in the sun as they came to, the color in their eyes
sharp as glass, there was a time when he thought
this could be her, a body becoming weightless.
Then a stranger cried in his arms. She didn’t
know anyone around her, especially him.
It did not matter. This is not about remembering.
Forget there was ever a spoon. Forget the sound
metal makes against the teeth & the tongue.
Forget it all & come back to your life.
John Pineda
Today was really rough, at least most of it. I hauled myself out of bed and went to a yoga class with
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Almost ducked out of movie night due to feeling awful (perhaps the return to school/work weighing on me) but ended up going and getting lots of snuggles and good touching and remembering just how much I liked that movie, and getting fantastic pics of the babies. Glad to have gone. Now, bed.