still all these years later
and probably always
I will know how
even in fall's dull decay
even as I am emptied
how rich the world
how it reads many books all
at once even as I strive
to get through one
I wish I didn't lose plots
as if I had holes in my
hands and my head
I've even lost the character
I used to be--who waits
for me to return
all her soul's myriad lights
merely dormant mirrors
for right now
________________
Note: I'm trying to escape. I'm playing word games in word worlds because things in the world are too horrific. Another refugee camp (Jabalia) and another hospital (Al Aqsa) were bombed today. The eleven students from Gaza who had signed up for the online course, "Literature Survey 2: Romanticism to Post-Modernism," neither showed up to our weekly class meeting nor responded to the class materials. If this were a regular class, I'd be worried things weren't going well, but in this extraordinary circumstance, I'm so worried something has happened to all my students.
Pic: Autumn colors and orange koi who came up to say hello. (Radiology Gardens; from a walk with LB. Big A and I took a walk right after this one. We got rained on, but stubbornly persisted for a full Super Sparty loop.)
12 comments:
Oh my friend. I hope your students are okay, I hope it was some kind of technical glitch. Sending love. xo
Take care.
Oh, what a terrible thing. It's unimaginable. All you can do is find the Courage to wait and the Hope that they will be able to be there with you.
This poem: wow. First of all, the tone is so quietly mournful and elegant. It's almost as if the speaker is sighing, on the verge of tears, wistful yet patient. I can feel the overwhelming tiredness, the waiting. The lines "how rich the world/how it reads many books all/at once" are such incredible imagery here. The enjambment especially makes the point stronger.
The next stanza makes such good use of alliteration, too, so that the imagery of the plot slipping through can be heard and felt as it's read. And ending that stanza with the human characteristics of hands and head moves nicely to the next one in which the speaker then identifies herself as the character.
And that final stanza! So beautiful, so sorrowful. The progression from character to soul, and the phrase "dormant mirror"--absolutely brilliant. A flicker of hope amidst the sadness.
Wow. Just excellent all the way around, maya.
Oh Maya. I hope your students are all okay.
Oh, wow. That is very hard. Hugs for you and many thoughts for your students and all the people who are being bombed right now.
That's what I've been holding on to too, Nicole... XO
Thanks, Gillian.
Thank you, Nance.
And thank you for this generous reading! (I'll confess, I wanted to do better than yesterday.)
Thank you, Suzanne, me too.
Thanks, Engie--it's unimaginable...
It must be so worrying.
<3 I know you get it.
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