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Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Poem: Crocheting in Four Steps

1. The Color

Know this: You
will end up hating it. Half-
done, the blanket will wind
through your sleep
in marled blue, horse-blanket
blue, a shower of chaff
in the barnlight,
red-flecked like the roan
you dreamed of riding. You wake
to solid white.


2. The Hook

An oar pulling the water. Pull
the face of it through, pull
the night behind you. Set
the face of it down. Rest.
Your hands must learn
the language of water, where
it ends, where the air begins,
where the dock is waiting,
stoic, hushed, a placid pole
that wants the rope.


3. The Knot

Build them alike, and they’re
an auspicious chain, as if
you never planned to pull them apart, as if
the knot were the aim and not
a mistake made over.


4. The Wool

Try not to think. The world is full
of things like this. In the morning,
you know the sheep are rising
like everyone else, and that
is living enough. At night, try not
to think of shears, or pens,
or moonlight speckled
through a ruined roof. Say
if they lived with you, you’d
take only what they brushed off
on a bush. You’d watch them
from the house,
clipping the hills like razors.
You’d never presume
to call them yours.


Posted for OpenLinkNight #5, dVerse Poets Pub http://dversepoets.com/

(appeared in Rattapallax)


9 comments:

  1. i really enjoyed this piece...particularly...

    Your hands must learn
    the language of water, where
    it ends, where the air begins,
    where the dock is waiting,
    stoic, hushed, a placid pole
    that wants the rope

    you use words well and it has a very nice flow to it...

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  2. No one is about to pull the wool over your eyes, wonderfully thought provoking piece.

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  3. So beautiful...and so calm and certain like the hands of an expert crocheter.

    Lovely weave Amy.
    Cheers
    Padmavani

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  4. Terrific! As a crochet-er and a poet, I'd say you excel at both!

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  5. Most enjoyable piece of free verse that could so easily be laid out as prose poetry. The flow within each segment is unhampered and allows the poetry to be accessed with ease. You make a topic that might sound boring pitched initially very interesting - the mark of a good writer. I particularly like this passage:

    the blanket will wind
    through your sleep
    in marled blue, horse-blanket
    blue, a shower of chaff
    in the barnlight,
    red-flecked like the roan
    you dreamed of riding. You wake
    to solid white.

    The visual device used here is strong indeed. Evocative imagery to say the least

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  6. This is such an AWESOME poem.

    You have such a superb sensitivity and imagination.

    I like the line about taking only the wool that would find its way to a bush.

    Really enjoyed this.

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  7. Thank you for your comments, dVerse poets! I'm so enjoying reading your work. Hope to see lots more of it.

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  8. I will say it-- this is a diamond in the chaff. A strong, beautifully crafted and clean poem. Brava! xxxj

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  9. lovely piece, enjoyed the 4th one best.

    keep it up.

    signed in to follow your blog, welcome following us back.

    ReplyDelete