Skip to main content

OH WORLD I LOVE YOU by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer


For many years I resisted the way things fall apart. I made a life out of holding things together…

I believed that poetry could work as a kind of glue, could help me to fix problems, could help me to know. But then, about two years ago, the world helped things fall apart so completely that I was able, at least for a moment, to see through my longing to make things neat. I could see through my desire to control the world. 

Since then, poems have become more a way of unknowing. I come to the page with curiosity instead of answers. Rilke writes in “Autumn,” about how this experience of surrender can lead us into “seeing” god: “And yet there is Someone, whose hands, infinitely calm, holding up all this falling.” This poem is about my ongoing practice of allowing the world to be as it is without trying to reshape or recreate it.

 Oh World I Love You

Oh world, I love you,
you with your roots
that thrust up through pavement,
you with your mudflows
and rockfalls and storms.
See how daily you feed
and destroy me. How
gorgeous your fruits,
how merciless your gravity.
I love you, world, how
you make me and fuel me
and undo me again and again. Always
another death to die
and always a new bloom.
Never the same, always
the same. World, it feels
too proud to say I am you,
you with your splendor,
you with your grace.
I am dust and ashes.
You move me, adventure me.
World, thy will be done.
My problems are not problems.
My laws all are nonsense.
My rules, my dreams are cages.
Sometimes I forget to let you
raze me. I try to wrestle
the club from your hands.
And when the destruction
is done, I try to rebuild the walls,
not seeing you were offering me
infinity. Sometimes you first bring me milk,
then tear me down tenderly,
your hands the hands of a lover
undressing me slowly, but not
stopping with the scarf, the skirt—
taking also every idea I have,
every certainty, every word,
everything I would say is mine.
World I am rambling through
the silence you hold for me.
I am like a woman dying of thirst
who splashes the water with eager hands
instead of cupping it, raising it to her parched lips.
Oh world, I am losing my mind
and laughing about it. All language
is dust, and look, you blow it away.
Still I am talking to you, crazy,
I love you, I love you. Come wind,
catch these words, rend them
from the one who thinks
she is speaking. Let them fall
all around her like leaves.  

Poet Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer “is a chanteuse of the heart,” says poet Art Goodtimes. She served two terms as the first poet laureate for San Miguel County, Colorado, where she still leads monthly poetry readings, teaches in schools, leads writing workshops and leaves poems written on rocks around the town. Her most recent collection, The Less I Hold, comes out of her poem-a-day practice, which she has been doing for over seven years. Her work has also appeared on A Prairie Home Companion and in O Magazine, on tie-dyed scarves, alleyway fences and in her children’s lunchboxes. Favorite one-word mantra: adjust. Visit her website here for ideas about writing, and to read her daily poems click here. 

~If you are interested in seeing your poetry appear in this blog, or submitting a poem by a woman that has inspired you, please click here for submission guidelines. I greatly look forward to hearing from you!~ 

Comments

  1. Whatta wide-armed opening of the heart. I've been following RWT's daily poems for close to a year; and this is hands-down, bar-none, no-question, one of her most best.
    Sometimes, we're allowed to be more thoroughly opened and receptive for the inspiration that envelops us---this is surely Trommer's outpouring of such a crystalline, grace-inundated moment.

    ReplyDelete
  2. & I Shall pay thanks to Eduardo for leading me to your world..
    This is a lovely piece specially the scene of the world's mighty hands leaving a fragile lady nude not only of clothes but of thoughts & beats.. thumbs up

    Peace & Light

    ReplyDelete
  3. Exposes the illusion of control with beautiful language. Mazel tov, Rosemerry!

    ReplyDelete
  4. The only way out is through...the heart, and Rosemerry has that in buckets and galaxies...thanks for leading us to this site, Rosemerry!

    ReplyDelete
  5. This certainly shares how we are truly not in control of what is so much bigger than us. When things truly fell apart all around me and in my life, I recognized this. And you, Rosemerry have completely captured those feelings in the most well written poetry. Thank you for this piece. Very well done.

    ReplyDelete
  6. The joy is infectious..........radiant and brimming over with light!

    Naomi Stone

    ReplyDelete
  7. OH! this poem causes me to fall wildly, madly, fervently in love with life! to dive face down into the nearest pile of fragrant autumn leaves, to run naked thru long awaited downpour! tear me to shreds, o life, un-do me, make me forget everything but the desire to feel keenly, to welcome, to fall in love with, every molecule in all of creation!! How is it that this body can feel every pain from all time and space, and not be incinerated??? how is it that suns and moons and galaxies can play their games inside this body,,,, and the body still has form?? oh I am losing my mind (whatever that is) thank god for this! I am be-coming un-done, oh thank god for this too!! oh let me all ways re-member,,, I AM all ways, by all energies,,,being offered infinity!! may I, and all of us, drink lustily from the cup of infinity.. proffered in every precious moment of Now.... thank you, O outrageous poem, for re-igniting wild and undiscerning love for life.... Thank you LIFE, for your indiscriminate -ness,,,, have I told you today that I love you??

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

IMAGINE A WOMAN by Patricia Lynn Reilly

  This poem invites you to look upon yourself with loving kindness… Gazing at your own true reflection, you will discover that everything you have longed for “out there” is already within you! I invite you to love your creativity fiercely. Faithfully plant seeds, allowing under-the-ground dormant seasons, nurturing your creative garden with love and gratitude. In the fullness of time, the green growing things thrust forth from the ground. It's a faithful, trustworthy process. AND it takes time and patience.  Blessed is the fruit of your creative womb! I invite you to trust your vision of the world and express it. With wonder and delight, paint a picture, create a dance, write a book, and make up a song. To give expression to your creative impulses is as natural as your breathing. Create in your own language, imagery, and movement. Follow no script. Do not be limited by the customary way things have been expressed. Your creative intuition is original. Gather

IMBOLC by Caroline Mellor

The inspiration for this poem came after I watched a magical winter sunset and full moonrise from the top of Firle Beacon in the South Downs... Unusually for me, I wrote the poem quite quickly and changed it very little before publishing it – perhaps the energies were working through my pen! Imbolc is the mid-point between the winter solstice and the spring equinox. It’s a fire festival which I particularly love because of its associations with Brigid, the Celtic Mother Goddess of arts and crafts, clear sight, healing, inspiration and nurturance of creative talents – something which, through my writing, I am always trying to connect with.  I also love Imbolc because, with so much darkness and negativity in the world today, it is a time for hope, potential, visioning and initiation. With love and blessings as the light returns. Photography by Chanel Baran IMBOLC    by Caroline Mellor I am the dream of awakening. I am the returning of the night.  I am the tough green

WINTER SOLSTICE: A GIFT OF LOVE by Carolyn Riker

I’ve had several days now of alone time… It is unusual and a gift that I couldn’t see until I breathed it. I have been able to watch the sun’s rise through the grey of dawn and smile at the flickers of frost melting on the waving boughs of evergreen. It’s unique to follow daylight as it traverses the tempo of a cat’s soft slumbering purr. Night comes swifter and the glow of candles and the flames of fire comfort me more than the steady stream of always-doing-more. As much as I resisted, I needed this break. I had no idea how much my body was trying to tell me   slow down   until the exhaustion settled in around my joints. My eyes swam in molasses. Heaviness of I-can’t-hold-out-much-long, walked me to the throne of my nest. It’s winter’s gift of self-nurturing and love. It’s been a quiet proclamation of femininity and a need for comfort foods. Lemon crisps and cranberry, white-chocolate shortbread dipped in tea; I felt a hint of being pampered without