Hi dear readers,
Before you read this poem, I feel as if i should warn you that it talks about guns and alludes to the trauma that guns can cause. And if this would in any way provoke you, I wanted to give you the chance to not read today’s poem. But it didn’t feel right to leave you poem-less … so here, in case you want a poem that does not mention guns, is one from a year ago today about beets in which no one gets hurt.
Thank you for joining me for this daily practice. I am so grateful you’re in this with me.
Rosemerry
Ambush
It only shoots lasers,
I tell myself as the biathlon
skiers skate by with guns
strapped to their backs,
smiles wide on their faces.
I smile and wave back
and on this most blue
day of winter, I start weeping
in the middle of the perfectly
groomed corduroy track as my
heart falls apart again, because
apparently that’s what this heart
does when reminded what a trigger
can do. Corrine holds me
until the tears slow
and we stand there together
in the spruce and the snow
until I am again exactly here,
in this year, on these skis,
on this day, with this blue,
with this sharp burn of loss,
with this still pulsing love,
with these arms of a friend,
with this heart that after two
years is no less broken. Nor,
I notice, is this heart less whole.
I don’t hear a gunshot,
just as I didn’t then.
I wade into the silence
like a baptism.
I can’t like this …it is too powerful and too true. I am in awe of your ability to say raw and agonizing things in a way that points toward healing.
I so understand what you are saying. Thank you for these words, thank you for coming alongside in these poems. Thank you.
Broken yet whole, the intensely personal and also universally recognizable state of being. Thank you for translating.
Oooooph. Yes, beautiful friend. every amazing to me the way the personal tells the universal story. Thank you for being so alongside me, Laura, thank you.
Laura and KAStilwell such astute comments!
Yes “broken yet whole” …. ‘ love” working through us?
Such a brave and healing poem!!
Oh thank you, Joanne ❤️❤️❤️
No less broken, no less whole, this is the gift of yourself you give to us Rosemerry. a deep bow of thanks and love
Oh Janice, thank you. Thank you. Bowing right back to you, dear poet
Both ironic and justified, this poem being prefaced with a _trigger_ warning.
“…this most blue day of winter” The word, blue, shoulders much weight in this sentence.
So much, also, in your closing quatrain. “I don’t hear a gunshot,/just as I didn’t then.” The quiet of the words belied by their thunder. “I wade in the silence/like a baptism.” “…of fire?” I ponder.
So often, we suffer with/in silence.
Yeahhhhhh … I became quite aware of the word triggered right after Finn died … the silence, home of both anguish and deep healing …
The line that snagged my heart: I wade into the silence/like a baptism. Powerful. Filled with hope and transformation. Exquisite, Rosemerry. ❤️
Hi Debora–I have missed you! I think you might have missed our last class? I was worried! This is all to say I am glad to see your name. Thank you for the kind words. xo
Rosemerry, I did miss the last class because I wasn’t feeling well, but I caught up on video. I’ve signed up for the grief series! Thank you for noticing my absence. I’m working hard at my daily practice, but work is not really the right word. It’s most often a form of play! ❤️
ahhhh! Hooray for the play! and glad you’re okay!