Friday, May 21, 2010

[poem#21] Breathe

(I don't know what this is...probably nothing)

Sometimes I forget how to breathe
in this world of azure and gray, of
yes and no. The air seems too thick
somehow, my lungs within me beating
their wings, my chest on fire. It all
seems too much and yet not enough.
And I look around for you, for help,
like you did in the brighter days:
when you would come up behind me,
take my head in your hands, and exhale,
and I would feel your motion calming
those frantic wings that threatened
to fly out of my chest.
But now you are breathing another air,
an air that I have just felt briefly tickle
the back of my neck before it was gone,
and so, I watch you from afar, folding
into myself for protection,
trying to keep the air clear.

1 comment:

  1. This aches. I love the imagery of wings and breath. And the emotion . . . as a world nomad, who feels like she's lost more people than she can count, it touches the deep longing that C.S. Lewis dares to call joy.

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