Light Calling

She held
  her life in her own hands
as if it were an egg.  Strange, small,
     fragile.
A world within, unknown. 
Unexpectedly still intact, she had never seen the whole
of a shell. She imagined
the egg pulsed; felt not vibration
from this hope but believed
    birth
not death
would be discovered if she were careful.

Between her thumb
and middle finger, she held it up to the light
streaming through her bedroom window,
to see if she might see inside
but found the covering too thick.
Still, with her index finger, she twirled
this secret little world around;
an oval earth rotating on axis of her will.   
She cupped it gently
                   in her palm,
feeling its cold, smooth shape.
She placed it on a piece of paper, spun it like a bottle
in a kissing game;

removed her touch and noted shadow
and when tired of speculation,
                 she devised a plan for hatching.
She made a nest of blankets in a basket
and went to sleep to wait.  She dreamed
she was inside the egg, warm and safe and placid,
curled up tightly in a ball.  She felt this
while her eyes were closed but a sound
from faraway
woke her and her eyes without permission opened.
Her confinement produced no great unease
though her feet began to tingle.

She strained
        to hear the sound outside herself− a voice,
muffled,
       deep.
Conflicting thoughts entered her mind. 
She felt compelled to venture out and meet the call
but also wary.  There seemed only one way out−
that of fracture and this, if she were honest, she feared,
so holed up like a mole in hiding she fell back asleep. 
For years. And in the dream she dreamed she woke
unable to remember where she came from but knowing
who she was. 

And light was streaming
       through
the bedroom, spreading over her, so welcoming
the day, she stretched
        and was subtly aware
that as she did, small bits of shell fell softly off her,
though overall this was unremarkable.  Sitting
on the edge of her bed, she stilled a moment before rising,
and asked the voice that was in the light if she might
be able to see at last the large world outside herself,
and for the ability to release her will, offering herself
to the divine, deriving
power from something higher, demanding nothing
and asking for help only and finally, when she stood,
                                                            with eyes wide open,
she walked out toward the calling,
                                                             unafraid.

Margo Roby

Our Bedroom

The lock on the door that does not keep the children out; every
size of sock, balled up, scattered everywhere, unpaired;
dead
deep-red roses
drooping sadly, heads bowed down, stems entombed in a clouded
vase− eleven of them, so, one short of a dozen
(strange); brown framed
               depiction
of a laughing, happy Jesus beneath a brown for background
canvas of our names in cursive inside heart of petals; bought
for twenty dollars at a yard sale,
          end of day,
two velvety violet-ish
couches, covered in dog hair, one doubling as a desk, the other
as a hamper; on the coffee table, another vase (this one tinted pink)
with withered flowers– these of unknown variety – purple, too many
to count;...

Plants do not fare well here.  Like the best-laid plans.

                         ... edges
everywhere, crossed, overlaid: books, furniture, shoes overlapping
the edge
where carpet meets tile;
edge of dresser, mantle,
nightstands, all surfaced with papers, trinkets, valuables
and not-so-valuables, threatening
to topple
off;...

There are no clear lines here.  Sharp-played piano keys sound
out.  I cannot tune
                        it out.
Not
plunking of rote song
but rather impromptu melody made by small, playful fingers,
moving like geed horses
and also bullet-voices marking breaks, shooting through
these flimsy walls.

...bluest blue sky
seen from my window; subtler blues inside, copycat shades
on candles, glass, hair on a painting where I was favoring
experimentation, in photographs, scarves,
sheets; lip balm in a small, round tin that I can’t open
but won’t throw out; few spots open for sitting or even walking;...

A dismal mess.  Signaling
   disorder
in our marriage? 
So says a study.

...blanket thrust off the bed in heat, still crumpled on the floor;...

What calm I remember, a ruse believed sub rosa, wrought carefully
with such intricate threads of denial.

...words, words, words, meandering across pages and pages−
poems, prayer journal,
notebooks full of distilled hope; (such
              shallow thirst)
attempts to release heavy weight of this; damaged trust
hidden in a drawer;
half-truths pandering to sentiment hanging on all the walls;...

Media in vitae in morte sumus.

...paperwork combed through for clues; in bowls, matching rings,
unworn; captured and enlarged mocking smile; the muck
of bad luck evidenced in disarray; indulged in urges; aroma
of your cologne, distinct; written rants; and more than what
is written here or even seen.

But, oh, beautiful, imperfect man− my room was a mess
before you moved in.

The Sunday Whirl
                       

HOW TO GRIEVE A DREAM

First:  acknowledge that it is a dream
you grieve−
nothing more.

I have just that.
Nothing more.  I have just begun. 
Have only just stood
in the hollow made by that assent
staring into the void, turning
my soiled hands around and around
to see if I can recognize the dirt
woven in with my veins.
Have only just
recently seen
that it (we− you) was
(were) merely what I wanted it to be
and nothing more.

How, seeking reality, did I,
made of clay, sculpt
man with such care, my hands
so gently
smoothing?  Yes, my fingers
can still feel skin where I thought
your face to be.  I cannot call to mind
an image of my thumbs sinking
into your flesh
carving out cup-shaped sockets
to look so deeply into
but here, I see,
beneath my nails, the mud.
What greater sin than this
surmoulage?  I do not believe I breathed
when we kissed.

I had a falling dream and woke to find
I really fell.  I am still plummeting.
In the mornings, words greet me.
Unfinished words, I long ago
(not that long ago) began to paint
stenciled on my wall.  The pencil
marks for every letter
are still there, illegible
from anywhere but up close
but the crimson color fill-in fills in
three letters only of a phrase
that was meant to say
a room of one’s own.  I left
the project incomplete
when you moved in.  

Too, unseen, behind books
another fragmentary sentiment:
Half-done purple painted verse:
Hosea 2:14.  I followed your voice
instead, afraid of the desert
and true tenderness.

All these partial writing on the walls.
Like the picture taken early on
that now looks altered in this light.
I can’t say quite how I perceived it before
but now your grin jumps out
too self-assured and my own small smile
registers a certain wariness as if that girl
knew more than what I know now.
And there I wore, and wear even now,
around my neck a symbol of your heart,
that supposed offering.

I think step two is to stop addressing
everything to you, to turn away
from that which I’ve created so I can see
in whose image I’ve been made.
To see what is truly bound,
not around my neck, but on my forehead,
what is tied as symbol to my hands,
what is fixed in my heart and mind.
What words expressed,

I do not wish to make you smaller
than life but only life-sized, finally
so I can recognize my hands when clean.
You can then break, freely.
I will leave your pieces be and pray,
confessing guilt for forgery
and after kneeling, my eyes will see
the evidence of woodwork, revealing
that I have never been alone.

dverse

These Things

A dream
is a poem
is a dream.  Obscure.  I am picking it apart
for clarity, piecing back as best I can, the glimpses,
fragile, lightweight half-truths that they are
and I am considering letting them drop.
                                  Letting them go.
(Though they shine)

I do not want to write you this.
I do not want to write one more poem for you.
I cannot avoid this.  I cannot mature
past this
point.
Past
     this dream.

You have just brought me a cup of coffee−
     these
are the sweet thing
you do.  You ask if there is anything else
you can do, lightly touching my back, leaning
                    in
to kiss me.  These things
that I’ve interpreted as love− as if love
is a formula to be expressed by specific
                   symbols.
But nothing is this simple.

You have left me with my coffee and my pen
to write.  Do you guess that I will write of you? 
My hands are bleeding.
As for the rest of me− what will
become of it now?  What
will  I look like
in the mirror anymore, I wonder.

We only ever saw the stars
                      so dazzling,
the one night.  Remember?  Even though
every night, I look up.  I said that night
that we were missing all the good stuff.
I don’t know what I meant.  These− all−
are just fragments.  Our foreheads touching,
unaware someone was taking a photo. 
Were you asking if there was anything I needed?
Did I fall asleep with vision of that moment?
Just that one.  That one and ones like it
and build dreams
to carry me through
the waking?  What will I do now?  Everyone
else was looking at the camera but all I saw
was you.

Margo Roby