some mornings
certain words
try to press into me
and I can barely feel them
I shake off their outlines
like they never meant anything
though once they were air
now I choke and splutter
It’s always scary and amazing how
that which once felt like life
seems like death
and some of what I had mistaken
for death
is a lot like life
just a bit of it
enough to get me past
the raging feeling that
all of this is for naught
vanity, vanity
and I don’t have the energy
to disassemble
and interpret
the complex
mixed-up
stories
that repeat
over again in my head
with no understanding
lessons gone unlearned
headlines unheard
screaming warnings unobserved
poetry forgotten
I drag myself into a
field of empty pages
desperate for some awakening
aching for an exclamation
yet
when words fail me
I know I put too much hope in them
they are empty without
the meaning behind them
a heart with no blood
bones with no skin
love with no risk
you can’t read in the dark
so I must let the light in
Ummmmmmm …. it’s a bit weird to say such a thing, but honestly, I really felt this poem to be part of my own narrative. My very thoughts!
Best summed up this way: “The best moments in reading are when you come across something – a thought, a feeling, a way of looking at things – which you had thought special and particular to you. And now, here it is, set down by someone else, a person you have never met, someone even who is long dead. And it is as if a hand has come out, and taken yours” – Allan Bennett ‘The History Boys’
Thank you so much!
Hi Emma,
It’s not weird at all. I LOVE it when that happens, it’s why I keep being honest in my poetry and putting it out there even when I don’t necessarily understand it. It is so much bigger than us. Thanks for the comment, it made my morning. and that is such a great quote.
One of your best Brooke.