What is Asking to be Looked At

You are turning away again,

you know you are.

Call it what you will –

balancing the check-book, work,

sock-matching-sock tucked one inside the other,

there, there, almost done.

You check your email often,

tell yourself surely there is more,

something else that needs tending.

 

Meanwhile, right there,

just outside the glass and

watching with shy eyes from the shadows

of the old yew that needs cut back again

to let in the light, there is something –

asking to be looked at,

asking to be spoken.

 

It will not be revealed without tenderness.

It will not scream for your attention

or grab your knee like your brother used to

creeping down the stairs

and crawling under the Yamaha while you

repetitiously practiced scales.

This will be a slow unveiling.

 

Go outside.

Stand very still.

Wait. Listen. Ask.

Maybe now you will say

warm breeze, or good morning,

or sunshine on opening tulip. Then slowly, tenderly

you might rename each thing, one by one by one,

a crescendo of words pouring from your lips, glorious and unending…

and there will be no pain as your heart rips open.

 

LAE2017

Monday poem 2017.8

1. For the paradox of wandering

in a mapped landscape,

for my half-blind eyes

and Your tiny blinding light,

I give you thanks, Oh Lord.

2. For the altered state of

ice over lake water, the kindness

of snow on snow on snow covering

a multitude of sins,

I give you thanks, Oh Lord.

3. For the cravings of knowledge

and the fear of the unknown,

for all that is or will be

and all that never will be so,

I give you thanks, Oh Lord.

4. For endings of childhoods

and each best loved dog,

the incremental demise of body and mind

that You say one day will rise,

I give you thanks, Oh Lord.

5. For closed doors

and open roads,

for edges of the wild world

and the nothing that is everything,

I give you thanks, Oh Lord.

6. For this moment, this chair,

fingers synapsed and sure,

breath, room, silence,

Your imagined and almost certain presence,

I give you thanks, Oh Lord.

LAE2017

Friday Poem 2017.7

2017.7

The heart,

always the heart. Those matters

of heritage, lifestyle,

and circumstance.

We make promises

and say what we mean

when we first say it.

Forever after we are somewhat unsure;

Did I say always? Sometimes?

Yes, I will walk each day,

eat more raw broccoli

and taste collard greens.

Yes, we will be kinder to one another, practice

lightheartedness, and forgetfulness.

By now some arteries are permanently closed,

but collaterals may grow, who knows.

Damage is indicated by various dashed lines

on the cardiac print-out. Your family doctor

will interpret these with you, and review

your wellness plan.

Blockages, self-righteous debates,

where to win feels like death by drowning;

selfish for air we grasp at anything.

How much tissue

has been greyed out

where once bloody and vital?

LAE2017

Another Thursday poem

 

Crane

They call on her for one thing only;

she is built to lift the weight

they cannot. They attach safety chains

and she swings beam after beam,

rafter upon rafter,

up and over the building site,

and lays down each piece

in its place. She knows

her capacity and her reach,

the stabilizing legs

hold her firm.

Do not ask her to dig

or scoop or drag.

Do not ask her to change

what she does best,

her gentle lift, the ballet

of all she carries.

 

LAE2017

Poem for Thursday

Mandarin

Plump curves and

burnished skin glowing,

not without imperfections but

what you see now is

what you already know

of her taste, nectar, quenching.

You imagine how your thumbs will gently open her

and your tongue will wrap itself

around the lusciousness

of each soft segment.

The air will carry her scent

long after satiation.

You reach for her

and close your eyes.

Oh, how her cool skin meets

the heat of your hands.

New poems

2017.3

She will do what she will do

no matter what words

your lips form into love knots,

no matter how long you stand

with your arms wrapping her sorrow.

There is nothing she will not do,

nothing held back. She is quicksand

seeded with landmines.

You must not walk here. Run.

Don’t look back. You could never save her.

Merciful Jesus, won’t you

gather her up like broken bread?

There is more than enough

to feed a multitude.

LAE2017

 

 

2017.4

The miracle would be…

the miracle would be going back,

to before we did what we’ve done

to each other,

back to kindness, and loving

exactly how you came to me

raw and imperfect,

magic and raucous,

before I dreamed up all the ways

I might mold you

into something less mighty.

The miracle would be

waking up and discovering

heaviness dropped in the dark

and a wheel within a wheel, turning,

like a movie’s opening

repeating, repeating, repeating

the part where she

notices him, just briefly,

then carries on. The moment where

what happens next

is anyone’s guess.

LAE2017

Poetry again

Ritual

It isn’t far
along the road
to where merganser calls
from the lake shallows. Swallows swoop
to kiss the surface, and in the scruffed willow
a canary seeks what she needs most.
Beauty is always here, the creek
emptying her season of heaviness
as I too will be emptied. This inevitable
ebb and flow, the grief
of making way. Waves wash
and return like a promise.
The mallard drake treads water
steady as the hen dips and eats
and dips again. Each calm repetition,
the layered mountains to the south,
receding soft
in the coming rain.

© Lesley-Anne Evans 2016

 

Haiku for the Hours

Dawn

Sun’s love is certain,
turns night storms to diamond fire,
each raindrop, a light.

Day

The orchard calls you,
trees are laden with words.
You of lack, come, eat.

Dusk

Monochromatic heart,
learn to hold the almost dark,
learn why robin sings.

Dark

Wild, nocturnal cat,
compulsive tracker of clues,
nine types of darkness.

© Lesley-Anne Evans 2016

Just write

A new year, and always I begin again. To wake up. To write. To cast my thoughts, words, dreams upon the water. To wonder at what it all means. What’s next, what’s new, what’s possible, what’s true, what’s better left unsaid, what’s needed now.

Just write…

2017.1

Slant light on the neighbour’s roof;
the first sun we’ve seen in days.
The snow glows with it. White hot. Hopeful.
Trapezoid rooflines point high up to the clear dome
and down to where the New Year and me sit
and concoct plans sharp enough
to pierce the ozone. Cold. Silence. Window.
The Monashee and their inhalations of sky. Breathe. Breathe.
Light is fading fast now, a vague
idea of what it was, what I thought
it might mean. Dusk. Blue land. Monochrome.

LAE2017

2017.2

After you pour the seed
they will come close,
like they already know something.
Chicka-dee-dee, rosy finch, black-capped junko
compete for one perch,
unaware of other openings
in the feeding tower,
or your kitchen table admiration.
They appear to trust you
and your “original mix” from Buckerfields,
but the glass between you is a false promise,
closer contact will prove harsh, or final.
Still you feed them. See how
they dart and depart,
dine and dash,
your lush communion brief, at best. See how
they wing away and eat at a distance,
heads cocked,
eyes on the sky
for sparrow hawk
who, like you, has dined here before.

LAE2017

We are not done

We Are Not Done

We are not done. We are
ongoing conversation,
sometime monologue, sometime soliloquy.
Done is undone in our transforming reality,
our we that is, and will be.
As perplexing as speech sometimes seems,
I will wrap my errant tongue unceasingly
around the shape of this dialect we long for
yet hesitantly speak. Years down the road
we’ll continue our halting imperfect communion
because we have chosen this holy union.

No. We are not done.
Done is baked bread filling the air
with aromas of childhood, golden crust, served up,
butter and jam, eaten, gone, done.
Done is my hair, washed, cut, coloured, and styled.
Done is your fishing trip into the wild.
Done is each finished task, our completed to do lists,
but done is not done when we both choose us.
Yes we will disagree for a time,
but when emotions
and the need to be right mellow and calm
we’ll be right back here; take my hand, carry on.

Because we are not done
striving, surviving, staying alive, relational jiving.
We are not done doing and undoing
all we’ve messed up, gluing what’s come unglued.
We don’t live the
“you complete me” sentiment.
We chose, our promise remains.
We are not done. Always, we begin again.

One day, I imagine
you will hear my breath reach
between the words I cannot speak,
nearly there, almost, there.
In that pregnant space you will hear
the language of your heart, beloved.

My heart will be the echo.