Blog - Wednesday Poems

Image:  Anything Is Possible (acrylic on canvas, 16” x 20”)

I love synchronicity.  Today’s Wednesday Poem is #17… and in a few days, on August 17^th, it will be Bill’s and my 45^th anniversary.  So, a love poem seems appropriate for this week.

Although tulips are not mentioned in the poem, I chose this image of abstracted tulips to pair with it, largely because of the title I gave the painting. It’s an early one, and one of the first I did that I felt succeeded.  I never imagined I would be able to paint, but just a couple of years after first picking up a brush, I managed this one.  So I called it Anything Is Possible.  In a way, that title suits this anniversary, too – because, all those years ago, when our friends heard we were getting married after being together for just five months, most said “it’ll never last”.  Well, here we are… and here, to honour love’s longevity, is my poem Touch, from my 1997 collection, Belonging (Sono Nis Press).

Touch

for Bill 

This morning’s sun lingers in our yard,
sheds gold on leaves –
eases up the stairway to our porch,
a casual presence

so like the lightness of your hand along my back
as you amble past me, out the door.
A filigree of touch, so delicate
I stand in stillness,

savour every subtle path your fingers traced,
their warmth of reassurance.
I bask in what we take for granted,
this absent-minded, second-nature care

blooms on and on like garden gloriosa,
saffron streaked with fire, their daisy faces
tilt imperceptibly to catch the sun’s caresses –

the way we turn to one another
with these small moments always in our hands.