Heidegger said
that we find ourselves in "thrownness."
In other words, we are thrown into the
world as we find it, and we piece ourselves and the world together from our
surroundings.
This poem reflects
a time in my life that was very happy yet also very painful, when I worked in
an x-rated video store. I knew that some of the people came to the store for
human contact, whatever a smile meant to them, and yes, I had real connections
to some of them. I am able to dole out small dollops of random kindness for no
reason at all.
Those were also my
years in College studying creative writing, and I had a wonderful group of
friends. We all had hard lives in Montreal, which is a rough town, according to
Americans, but we had fun, and shared our knowledge and learned from one
another.
Although my circle
of friends are not in the poem per se, I still feel I was very vibrant and
loving at the time because I was surrounded by the good energy of friendship.
Like
Water
Like water in the trees when the voice
Of the wind is still as a holy ghost. Like
believing
In me, I was once a downtrodden porno girl,
Giving little amounts of love with a real
sparkle
In my eye, diamonds, the kind that say,
I cannot love
You, I am sorry, but I am forbidden to do
anything such
As that, but if I could love you, I most
certainly would,
Fellow crying wind-snap whiplash being
Tossed about like me on the waves
Of this wicked world. The machine does this to us.
The machine is the opposite of the bird
That rises in the heart up the windpipe
And wants to sing. Sparrow-leaden light.
I am no lone crow, though some think so.
Like no snow-capped mountain, no leopard
In leotards with sunglasses and high heel
sneakers.
I’m merely a dragon plum, a plume of white
Smoke writing like a feathered quill,
Calling the angels, calling and calling
And calling collect until one day they might
Accept the charges and talk to me,
In even, uncomplicated tones, in ways
That spill and sweeten my morning coffee.
It’s morning, now, and the sun is risen
Like an umbrella, and I don’t see any rain
In the foreseeable future, like just
The music of the masses coming
Together, saying to one another
With no hate, hello, shalom, bounjour,
Ruya, ruya, ruya, pax, capiche, comprende.
It will happen if we try,
Because we know we already have a great
Understanding of each other
When we pass each other, and, like the
strangers
That we are, complete strangers,
We do not nod hello good day,
But pass each other,
Staring straight ahead,
Like we are listening to the sound
Under the silence of the flowing water.
~
Jessica Harman is a writer living in Boston. She studied Creative
Writing at Concordia University in Montreal, her hometown. She earned an M.A.
in Health Communication specializing in medical research methods at Emerson
College in 2003. She has worked as a video store clerk, art store girl, medical
researcher, and creative writing teacher. Her first full-length poetry
collection, "Dream Catcher," available here, was published in 2012 by Aldrich Press
in California. You may find her on her poetry blog here or facebook 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!~
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