Watermark

2008-12-09 Snapshot Poem

Not an orphan yet, I come to you.
Snow here is heavy and wet, sky
darker than ground. The doctor
reads the future in runes of blood
and bone.

I watch the snow fall, slant, across
the streetlight. The kitten brings me
her feathered toy, like a dead bird
in her mouth, a low growly purr.
A gift.

The body sends its messages.
Mine calls out to you in dreams.
I wake stunned and languid. I wake.
The doctor casts the coins, mother's
next few months.

Or years. They lay out before us,
dark and secret paths. The kitten
pounces, stops to watch paleness
pass the window. Now is for her.
Don't leave me.

   

Dreamer

Somebody came to my door and offered
to give me a child who had been abandoned.
I declined but thought of you.

They say that in dreams, the house is the body.
Or perhaps the psyche. A house of many rooms.
But who is the child?

Who is the offerer? Who the prospective parent?
What is the car, the truck, the train? They are,
each and all, the dreamer.

This is the vehicle, the work, the task. It carries
me where I must go. Me, the child, the parent.
The dreamer. The poem.

    

  Totally Optional Prompt: Sound -- I added the sound player in response to this prompt. More of my poems with audio can be found at Audio Posts. This prompt has nudged me to add sound to more of my poems. The player above is an experiment -- please let me know if you have problems.

     

This poem is already up at Poets Corner -- Thanks, Anny!