vendredi 17 septembre 2010

Beneath the Surface




I was a fisher's wife
and I know fish stories better than anyone,
better perhaps than He who scattered them,
for I have recited them as
verbs to a language:

Diving until my belly
runs through the weeds,
slides across mud,
taut with a slow exhalation, then easy pump,
and a searching with the hands.

As my lungs grow thick,
I rise to the light,
a bubble to the mass,
one wave of the arms and
I'm gone:

     Here behind you!
     Across the pond!

I view the rain in a mirrored hand
beneath the clear black surface,
where each drop forms a perfect arc
and the world becomes
an open mouth.

4 commentaires:

bluerose a dit…

Inspiring imagry

Laura Tattoo a dit…

thank you, blue rose, an older poem i've always liked. i've been having trouble writing lately with my illness; my thoughts have not been contiguous! i will come visit you. xoxooxox

bluerose a dit…

I'm so sorry you're not well. I, too, am having trouble writing. Words just aren't coming to me right now. Hope you're feeling better soon!

John Walter a dit…

Beneath The Surface displays an intuitive, open-ended control over the material that is its source (all the variants of the Fisherman's wife tale.

One senses a deep dive into the unconscious (I thought of the Canadian poet Margaret Atwood, as well as Adrienne Rich when I read the passage of the speaker's thickly described swim strokes through the muck) but your clear, vivid imagery allows the poem to be appreciated as an essential affirmation of personal identity, regardless of deeper levels of consciousness implicated that point toward a terrible life struggle and a resilient spirit that has the audacity to call to her lover who she has stealthily outdistanced with her underwater torpedo maneuvers.
I absolutely loved the final stanza, Laura. You summed up the poem perfectly as an opportunity for an indefatigable survivor with a thirst for precise language for experience that sets her free--a spiritual maw beckoning as "an open mouth."
I felt charged by the time I'd finished rereading this a second time.