Balance
What is standing across from me
on the other end of my seesaw
to prevent me from catapulting
into the sky. Or smashing down
through the floorboards, splinters
floating up like volcanic ash.
What is my counterweight, and
what body does it borrow when
it manifests itself to me. Does it
jump on and off, rattle my stance
by jiggling a foot. How steady is
the ground, right now. On a scale
of Richter-registered tremors to
Mount Sinai composure, where
is this patch of planet. Dear deity
of gravity, I feel there is something
between us. Thank you for sharing
this fulcrum so very graciously.
gosh... so very many mental images form here for me. Bizarrely (i don't know maybe I'm losing it?) the first few paragraphs felt like I was reading a woman, desperately yearning or wanting for unborn children to whom she cannot get pregnant to be there...probably random but something about it triggered me.
ReplyDeletefulcrum is a gorgeous word too... isn't it?
Gorgeous hannah, as usual..
thea.
xx
I, too, am grateful to whatever (or whoever) is opposite you on the seesaw, aptly also called teeter-totter (not by New Yorkers, for sure). But the fact that you sense there IS something giving you balance is most reassuring. Maybe YOU are your own counterweight, watching you, smiling, protecting, reassuring, loving.
ReplyDeleteAnother little diamond of sharp focus and wit.
ReplyDeleteHere are my two favourite pronouncements on balance:
I balanced all, brought all to mind,
The years to come seemed waste of breath,
A waste of breath the years behind,
In balance with this life, this death.
W.B.Yeats
In art and dream may you proceed with abandon. In life may you proceed with balance and stealth.
Patti Smith
"Dear deity of gravity, I feel there is something between us."
ReplyDeleteI love that line.
Happy New Year Hannah!
I went back to my grade school playground, quite happily! xx
ReplyDeleteYour diction is as fluid as it is succinct. How do you DO that? :)
ReplyDeleteMy fave part:
"On a scale
of Richter-registered tremors to
Mount Sinai composure, where
is this patch of planet."
PS: Happy almost New Year! Can't believe 2011 is nearly here.
deity of gravity.
ReplyDeleteyou rock.
lovely....so glad the image called forth words
ReplyDeleteSiobhan