Samantha’s Daily Poem
Tiny defeats
He wobbles
little toes curled
clawing
with effort
to stay upright.
I envy
his earnestness
he knows
he will fall
the tiny defeats
are built in
to the journey.
What shorted out
our evolution
to make us believe
as adults
that we must never
stumble?
When I am old
I don’t want
to wear purple
I want to
wear
out
my resistance
to loss.
Public radio
My affection
for public radio
borders on
fervent.
I admit
I am late
for important occasions
because I drive around
and around
harnessed
to an interview
with an author
plump with fame
and wit.
I listen
exalted
smiling recklessly
at other drivers
while my creativity
roars.
The world is good.
Works of alarming imagination
are within me.
The interview is over
and before I can find
a parking spot
a dispatch
from somewhere in Africa
I will never go.
My heart shudders
and I ache
in that way that feels
right
when all you can do
is honour suffering
with tears.
I drive around
some more
immersed
transported
captured.
A king
with a full court
of sages and scribes
was never
more spoiled
than I.
Ode to Immanuel Kant
Your neighbours set their clocks
by your daily walks.
Was your whole life
woven so tightly
or were they your one ritual
in an otherwise
unhinged life?
I studied you
in university
and for years afterward
you hung on
talons in the flesh
of my mind
imposing your unsettling
infatuation with time
insisting it did not exist.
In an odd way
you made me a writer
irritated me
into scratching
some permanence
some legacy
just in case you were right
and time is an invention
I wanted vengeance
on a simultaneous world
indisputable proof
that I was here.
Gardening has nothing to do with gardens
I always thought gardening
was a slow lumber
in the dirt
a hobby for old
clump-shaped people
a patient
repetitive
toil.
I am not to blame.
It was given the wrong name
like calling a shark
a fish.
Gardening
has nothing to do
with gardens.
It is sleight of hand
illusion, hot wet
underground alchemy
where secrets are whispered
to wisps of seeds
shocking
them into bouquets.
The present
The present
paper thin
be careful
it is dissolving
as you read this
new moments
erupt under your feet
fill each one
with awareness
witness
your heart beats
can you believe it
your body coaxes
you onward
constantly
utter faith
that you will
spend the offering
of life
wisely.
