A Stain

The efficacy of trying to un-ring bells

A glass filled above the rim

Keeps it all bound together with some conjured internal tension until 

The moment it can't.

Water flows

Abrupt and familiar disorder, seeking its level on the counter,

Washes over the boards which resist the absorption until it finds 

That spot 

Who's oil has long since dried away to wherever it goes and it seeps in,

Slow as spring,

Whispering decay to the fibers.

A cloth makes clean for that weekend's company and 

Next year's black-green hint of rot knows

It's too late for sanding. 

Reviews

[Eilis]

I’ve read this a few times. I find the metaphor to be original in my own reading experience, and I like the way it creeps up on you. You mention the efficacy of trying to unring bells and that idea permeates the poem to my mind. The slow movement of consequence and how we often aren’t aware of its impact for some time to come.

I really appreciate the symbol of the overfilled glass—the water held in place by tension—and the inevitably of its being shaken and spilling over. Time nor experience are static. Movement permeates all things. And something is bound to come along and bump the glass. Tension has a tipping point if it is not afforded the ability to ease. What follows is not fully understood until the future.

That future could be moments or years, but it will come regardless of what we try to do to stop it. This my take away from the poem, anyway. A kind of what’s done is done idea being acted out in the dance between spilled water and time.

Really enjoyed the way the single idea was carried throughout. The inevitability is somewhat ominous, but also there’s a beauty in the way that nature (in the context of the poem) transforms. Consequence feels burdensome, and the recognition of that feels quite important here. Great poem here.

[Sean Quinn]

Thank you, Eilis. I appreciate the feedback. I've really been trying lately to narrow the focus of things I write and take out much more than I otherwise would. I'm not sure how much I like the structure I went with on this one but I tend to tinker a lot.

Thinking back to when I wrote this down, the context was in an argument and how things can be said when the situation is heated that become these sticky ideas in our heads that crop up much later, after things have long since cooled.