Nothing is forever
Waking from this long slumber,
I am surprised
the world is still here,
that the frayed edges of hills
still rise up
to meet a sky which seems
a clearer shade of blue,
that summer rain
tastes sweet again.
The seeming permanence
I slept through
has yielded
to confirmation that nothing
is forever,
and the triumph of having survived
the unanticipated difficulty
of the road
joins with knowing how easily
I could have broken
on the stones
along the way.
It is the fearless touch
of skin on skin
that sets chords vibrating
along my spine,
reminds me that each of us
is wired for touch,
that only skin
stands between us
and world,
that hip bone will always
connect to neck bone
by way of heart,
that lips will recognize and meet
in perfect pairing,
that an idle finger,
brushing a wayward lock of hair
from forehead,
will always welcome me
back to life
through the blessing
of touch,
the sweetness and embrace
of a forgotten dawn.
and none shall sleep
The clocks have stopped.
Time, in our perception,
does not exist.
In imposed stillness,
we sense the earth's slow shift
beneath our feet,
the effect destabilizing,
as if we have contracted some dis-ease
of the inner ear.
Time zones and borders
do not exist,
checkpoints are abandoned:
no one wants to cross.
Big Ben has ceased its bass-note gong,
the Glockenspeil refuses to celebrate
an olden king.
In San Marco's piazza,
two bronze figures
rest.
Oh, silent night,
pandemic night,
consolation of having
our hours measured .
gone.
A low murmur spreads
across the earth,
enters the oceans.
Sea mammals and fish swim
in non-concentric circles,
internal compasses disabled
by the low-pitched hum.
Birds choose a branch,
bury heads beneath their wings ---
what they can't see won't hurt them.
The murmur grows
in increments,
becomes an Esperanto
requiem of loss,
leaves auditory signs
to interpret.
I can't breathe.
Pandemic
spring came and went,
bringing daffodils one day,
erasing itself the next;
we take what we can get close to
as we ache into gaps
left by arms embracing only
empty air.
the neighbour I barely know
is an approaching friend:
oh long-lost human,
companion me
from a distance,
share your fears and hurts
so I can rediscover continuum
in this march of days
which crumble
into unfamiliar longing.
listen to my breath's flutter
from around the corner;
place your thoughts upon my heart
to still me,
and when you can,
pick detritus from my hair,
groom me to rejoin
the human race.
I need to know
not just for me
but for all waiting hearts,
for all faces pressed to windows
of longing,
for all hands raised in unseen farewell.
We
need to know.
If time's markers disappear,
will we forget to count our hours and days?
Will a calendar become
a curiosity on the wall,
a numeric puzzle we can no longer decipher?
When we pause, and nothing moves
except the inhale/exhale
of our breath,
will memory still recall
this lacuna in our lives?
When our present
becomes our past,
will events disintegrate
into random parts,
move beyond memory's grasp?
If we meet again,
or when,
will our bodies remember
our last touch?
Will our tongues remember
words which came easily
to our lips
though we were speaking them
for the first time?
Will the warmth of hands
travel directly to the heart,
release all the dreams the other dreamed
while we were apart?
Will isolation make us strangers,
greeting each other as if
we had never met?