Wednesday, 11 July 2018

So quiet, but not

You've been so quiet, said one of my readers.

But quiet has gone. A lone, lanky, lovely visitor dropped in on me
entirely unexpectedly. How now to find
my silence, whence the new things come?

It is an opportunity to strengthen, to refine me, to define
the boundaries of my crankiness, the rudeness of
my solitude.

And then a friend
whose face lends me
its poem.

Bow-line

You've a bow-line arcing
up from your eye 
into your brow -

as if you've always held a quantum of your thoughts aside
- in case you'd one day need them 
for a dancing star.

- Silke Heiss, 8th July 2018

3 comments:

  1. These are both lovely Silke.

    The reflective objectivity of the first is precious.

    That the first leads into the second (my reading) is special

    The shooting star simply has to be you.

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  2. Thank you, Paul, for your kind words. As for the shooting star - the mysteries etched into the lifetime of a face are not for me to impose myself on; though I suppose the shooting star image reveals how I read that pleat of skin I happened to notice.

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  3. All these days passing have said to change the word 'shooting' to 'dancing'. It more exactly describes the soul who is the subject of the poem; 'shooting' is the image of a wish; 'dancing' captures an organic, indeed, creative dimension that'shooting' lacks. The joy of self-editing is the never-ending invitation to keep up with the pace of insights.

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