As if I sit, silent, fishing gear suspended over dry
earth, the ocean, far away, pushing against an
indifferent shore. While all the love has escaped
into the sky and become the sun, the sharp May
heat a reminder of what it could be like, closer,
higher, if we dared to leave the shade. I dream of
asking the questions that matter. Not looking for
answers. Why someone is. Why someone left. Why
I never win the memory games I play with myself.
Nothingness must have the same intensity as
summer, the same trigger as damp skin, the same
conviction of jasmine, the same postulation of a
first kiss. The same hope that waits for a fish to bite,
the end of a question trembling in the deep quiet.
And “Nothingness must have the same intensity as / summer, the same trigger as damp skin, the same / conviction of jasmine, the same postulation of a / first kiss.” But I left out the pauses in your lines, the reaching for the love affair wuith words and place. Sometimes I do that fishing in my own head, not remembering the answers.
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Simply beautiful, Rajani!
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Thanks so much, Sara.
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Your poem is lovely!!
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Thank you, Helen.
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There are hard questions and there are harder questions and to answer them can be as futile as trying to catch a fish on land.
I really love the imagery in your poem, makes me wonder. 🙂
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Thank you so much. I think sometimes, because the answers don’t matter anymore or are powerless to change anything.. the healing, the moving-on can be triggered by just being able to put those questions out into the universe. Maybe that is enough to let go and go forward. Thanks so much!
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interesting concept – not looking for answers but just asking questions. I guess sometimes that is what stretches before us – the unknown. Lovely
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Thanks so much, Margaret. If the answer won’t change a thing in the present, then just being able to ask the questions should be healing enough… maybe.
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Love the last two lines. Such powerful imagery. I can see the hope, the question just waiting… for what might come.
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Thanks so much, Magaly.
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Beautiful and wonderful way to end the poem.
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Thanks so much, Debi.
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I keep coming back to the line of about the intensity of nothing and how it can be stronger than memory sometimes. I wonder if that nothing is a friend or foe. Friendly in cushioning us against the pain that comes with memory and foe in stealing any vestige of sweetness in that past and perhaps even in our ability to taste it again in the future.
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Absolutely.. I have learnt that when we block things out as a coping mechanism, the good is often lost with the bad. The nothingness then is both friend and foe… a mountain that needs to be climbed. Thanks so much, Rommy.
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A beautiful questing piece, I thought Rajani. Loved the notion of all the love escaping into the sky and what a clever, touching and deeply poetic finish too: “first kiss. The same hope that waits for a fish to bite, the end of a question trembling in the deep quiet.” Great!
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Thanks so much, Scott. Glad it resonated!
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wow just beautiful My favourite lines are:
‘While all the love has escaped
into the sky and become the sun’ and
‘Nothingness must have the same intensity as
summer, the same trigger as damp skin, the same
conviction of jasmine, the same postulation of a
first kiss.’
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Thanks so much, Marja. Glad you liked it!
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Beautifully said, and beautifully realised.
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Thanks so much!
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Very beautifully expressed, my friend.
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Thanks so much, Sherry.
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