Where art thou?

People ask me where I've been and I am mystified.

I mean, I don't know if they mean recently-

or ever-

neither of which is that fascinating-

          which is completely untrue.

Nobody ever asks me this.

I have recently considered how Primo Levi said the glaciers melting 

in green varicose veins 

          could not be described.

He reminds me of Pluto in nebulous ways,

after all, he said it actually tasted like sky.

I guess we have all tried to touch rainbows, 

     and I think most of us prefer shiny things,

not semi-transparent or deflecting items such as prisms

     or  iridescence. 

Honestly, I am still trapped, 

so tell is all I can do. 

It takes determination, geometry 

to hold on to other crystals like granite,

becoming solidified, and structurally sound for a time

bond even, but really just passing through. 

This is how too, 

          rivers are reminiscent of veins 

                         and the passing of blood,

like what is liquid or solid 

               and divides me by you. 

Painting By J.E.H. MacDonald (1873/1932) [Public domain or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

 

O' Frosty Well Wisher

On a crisp October morning
                                pondering
For Once, then something,
                                and walking up to the
Well
knowing-this space of Sunday-
                                light like water
can be contained
in a soul cup.

A leaf
          Bob's on top, floats,
ripples rile his rite to disillusionment to-
day,
the way
some seek these shimmering somethings-
Although, as the pessimist already knows
the echoes
                                 signal emptiness,
or
depth
perception.

When he peers down
                                 beyond superficial self-reflection
he alone wonders
why water doesn't wait
                                 for focus
or stand as straight as a
Wall.

On Frost,
with the-
               well,
                        frozen over,
whispering whiteness wonders
when it will all become clear again,
For once,
then nothing
                    but wishes taken for granite
reliable as a wall.




This poem was inspired by and in conversation with the poem by Robert Frost titled, For Once then something.

Image credit By Syed Usman Ali (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. 

Things we take for granite

Walking by a pile of ordinary granite
my daughter noticed a glimmer.
Delighted with the sparkly sight,
she asked me why it shone so,
It's just DG, I said plainly,
So, you don't know,
she replied rhetorically.

I too remember when
the world was more than real
you could feel the newly forming
foundations building up
under you, from deep inside
your hot energetic core
spreading slowly like land
determined and undeterred
not oblivious and permeable
nor in the hurry of water
its mad dash with a splash
molten rock chooses to ooze instead
I remember a time
when steam jets barely cooled our fires
and together we tamed the wild world,
before us digging up and burying forevermore
weary from moving around in endless Revolutions
We finally settled.

Like throwing pepper around the perimeter
so pedestrian people wont notice
tremors of short fused attentions
unable to make the connection, cross the bridge
to take the leap, to draw a rough line,
to reconnect
the connection of
the extra and ordinary.

From leading edges, subdued and stable
the matrix locks its labyrinth
in the basement
of continental islands.
Granite is there.
Unanimously equigranular,
metamorphically unique,
on this marble rolling
in concrete space.

Catching the light just right
the quartz and phenocrysts insist
on throwing off latent sparks;
like kindled memories of plutonic days
mingled in potassium feldspar rays
streaked pink with passion
the blushing boulders
pushed by Sisyphus
eternally carry us forward
as though not moving a pebble,
or grain, or granule, granum, granite
swallowing our diamonds along the way
decomposing
and eroding
molding
the upper crust
down to
their carbon core.

One should never ignore
the things we take for granite.



Image by Halvard Hatlen (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.