marbles

 

 

 

Each time,

when me and Martin met, we dropped

to one knee, close to the ground

to where the marbles lay

 

still in circles drawn in the earth. He

carried in his pocket the BOLDER that

with nothing more than a flick

 

of his thumb, would destroy the cat-eyes

sending them scurrying into curb

and dandelion.

 

Not knowing it was metaphor

for the lives we would later choose,

eponym perhaps

 

as we groped for belief; the naming

of secrets, even the ones too unbearable to keep.

The daughters out of wedlock,

 

their mothers left spinning

in the exodus of 82. How both

of our fathers, (war heroes), would loose

 

their memories simultaneously in the frame houses

that needed paint and new stairs;

new wooden zigzags

 

five feet high by five feet wide with pine planks

that could be hammered if one could

remember

 

what nails were for. How they held down,

over extended periods of time, ice like some

triadic Greek ode.

 

How it followed the strophe and the antistrophe.

How a child could sit there collecting the maple's

Samara seeds

 

the ones we called helicopters in our supposed fiction.

But like things that land softly,

become unparalleled,

then go straight up to heaven,

 

I guess they were.

Reviews

[Corset]

I'm starting to get lines across the bridge of my nose from squinting into the heart and soul of poems, I remember those helicopters from childhood, and I love how you incorporated them into this poem, with the wonder of a child is how I read your poems, even when I'm not sure if I should be throwing things into the wind.

[Great Aunt Astri]

I like the way you have written this poem ... with stanzas running into each other. The images you bring up are so evocative.

[Horizon K.]

Dana, you have whisked me right into such recent moments with my son... Playing with marbles and helicopter seeds! And then taken me into future visions, me hoping it won't, though knowing it will happen anyway, he will be breaking hearts and his own someday... Yesterday, he painted wolves, sending rain down on the world around them-- now what does That mean, for going straight up to heaven?! Wow, you really have me thinking dana! I really loved this piece, and that final stanza- took me up with it!

[W.k.kortas]

As the wise Corset said, it is a marvel how easily you can interweave different times of a life without losing a single stitch in the process.