This Poem Is a Prayer
by rebecca ~ May 1st, 2007. Filed under: Poems & art.
(University of Minnesota Arboretum in autumn, 2006, photo by me)
This poem is a prayer for space and solitude and I have built it
word by word, star by star, leaf by leaf, and snowflakes
times thirty three. It stands here like a red brick house
constructed with sturdy hands and baked in the oven
of sun and wind. It took time to settle. A fire crackles
and nearby cat and god, entwined, now sleep.
Four windows provide what I need: a birch, a maple,
a weeping willow, and a cottonwood, respectively.
Today its walls muffle car horns, tire squeals, silence
flags flapping greed, and no one knocks, dressed
in vinegar or bile, on the door. In simple words, I’m free.
This poem reminds me that breathing in & out, or out & in,
is not quite what caged gerbils racing round on wheels do,
nor is a life best patterned after others—who tie themselves
to desks with electrical cords—doing this & that, that & this,
and, then again, this & that, frantically never reflecting
whether it’s necessary to be poster children
for chronic stress and certain coronary disease.
Today I climb inside myself, brush away cobwebs and sweep
dust bunnies out my mouth. Let these tasks erase from me
all deaf & blind labor. Time to refuse more dreams of me
in muddied jeans scribbling binary code compulsively
into the flesh of infinite fallen, rotting trees.
I am not expecting this poem to be strong enough
to be the savior of my tomorrow nor will it disclose
the mystery of the disappearing honey bees. Nor do
words alone hold in their possession a golden key
to release the overworked & underpaid from ending up
six feet under the cleats of ugly-spirit folk in red & blue
plaid slacks who drink gin on the final 9th tee.
This poem, at most, blooms briefly as a lilac bush in Babbitt
or emits a spice as faint as a tiny orchid on the hillside of Kauai.
Here I can cherish the smallest hint of beauty
(of which those, so ill, seek to trap, to stab, & categorize).
I built a hut of A-B-C & onto to Z to restore an ability to love
myself, my life, and to acknowledge my neighbors
who suffer near me. There is a polar bear at Como Zoo.
His grief is written across a blue sky with repetitive somersaults
and mad splash. Today I am cradling his bloodied head
against my chest, whispering him our dream, a kiss
of sleep, of reverberating tundra and expansive sea.