Blog - Wednesday Poems

Above: Elder, 7" x 5", framed archival digital photograph (sold); 

For quite some time now, friends and I have been bemoaning the state of our memories.  This past week has been another one of forgetfulness for me, topped off a few days ago by missing an important film I wanted to see.  We all know this is a normal part of the aging process, though we can't help but worry just a bit about dementia.  For most of us happily, so far, dementia is not the issue.  Thinking about this reminded me that one of the poems in my "Tai Chi Variations" sequence is on point.  So today, I'm posting "Needle at Sea Bottom" from my book Suddenly, So Much (Exile Editions) (more about this sequence follows the poem).  

Below: Gone to Seed, 6" x 4" digital a photograph - one I sell as a birthday card - but only for folks with a sense of humour! 

Needle at Sea Bottom

In middle-age you begin 
to forget little things, lose them
like dropped stitches.  Just yesterday,
even the needle disappeared into the depths
where the misplaced wait 

to be retrieved.  Now you stroke the air 
as if you are crawling through water,
but the movement becomes a dive deep enough 
to touch bottom.

All the way down you peer into green
light, caress memories you have long wanted
back, gather them into your arms
until it is time to breathe again
and resurface, buoyantly
empty-handed

I began the Wednesday Poems blog last April with another poem from this sequence.  What I didn't mention then was how these poems came to be.  It was 1997, my third book had just been published and I was in that common but always disturbing space of wondering if I would ever again have anything to write about.  At the time I was in a wonderful group of women artists and writers (Sex, Death and Madness ). When I mentioned how I was feeling, Claire Kujundzic suggested I look for something new and different to do, something that would take my mind off worrying about what might come next for my writing.  It was the perfect suggestion.  I decided to follow in the footsteps of my mother and one of my closest friends, both of whom practiced and taught Tai Chi. I found a class at my local community centre and started in, with zero intention of writing poetry about it. I just wanted a new experience, a practice that would be good for body and soul.  But the minute our instructor began naming the poses, the writer in me was off and running. The names themselves were poetry:  which meant each week I came home after class inspired. And there began a wonderful cycle of learning Tai Chi movements, discovering their beautiful names, then spending the following days crafting the poems those names called up.