Tags
Elaine Stirling, imagination, laments, pain, perception, prose poetry, sad poetry, snow shoveling, storm sewers, transitions
The husk around the heart hurts like hell when the freshness within breaks through. Gibran said it better. So did Harry Nilsson who called it belly achin’.
Pain while it gurgles away loves to have its say, but the flow of slush into a storm sewer doesn’t interest me much, even when, especially when, it’s set to verse. You’ll forgive me, I hope, if I ignore laments, including my own, in favour of the advent of crocuses.
Shoveling wet, heavy snow, I mourn the friend I can’t get near because of the one who’s deemed herself the myelin sheath that coats his neurons. Two intelligences halved, coconut closed, which, I suppose, is where that unfortunate phrase, “my better half”, comes from.
Well, the melt is under way, so I shall ignore the plow that delivered a fresh rampart of snow cement between me and the world’s roadways. The freshness that broke through kindly allows me to sift through the fragments of erstwhile heart-throbs and desiccated grudge, one of which appears vaguely boat-shaped and may be float-worthy long enough to sail me past and over the gurgles.
Sure enough, I spy an island up ahead, not far at all, with a swaying coconut, lime trees, and a boombox with a sonnet.
See you there!
Essay © Elaine Stirling, 2013
Image from mindbodygreen.com
Oceantics 
Oh, I hear ya, sister.
Myelin.
And maybe atrophy.
I wonder when this place of solitary confinement will come to an end. Sometimes I’m convinced it’s my own damned fault.
Here the cement slush is traded for torrents of rain, the cold moist, penetrating through the layers of protective coatings despite our best intentions to keep dry, putting out the inner fires I’ve worked so hard to restore over the years. Like trying to burn green wood – I’m just not catching fire, despite feeling dry and brittle in my deepest parts.
Gorgeous piece, as always.
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Thank you, Adriane. I dropped by your blog and read your piece on vulnerability and enjoyed our parallels. Weather-wise, I figured you’d be way ahead on the west, and you will be, soon!
It’s not often that moods like this hit me, but I do know, from the deepest of my deeps, what I will never consent to in a relationship, and it breaks my heart when friendships can’t cross those fake jealousy-based boundaries.
Your fire will catch, dear friend, I know it! And I truly appreciate your sisterhood presence on this one.
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Beautiful, spare, and brave – ending with a with a glimpse of bountiful flow up ahead. Wishing you speed to the bounty.
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Thank you, bridge2vision, for reading and for your kind comments. I send you best wishes too from snowy southern Ontario.
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