By Jennifer Hayashida
February on another coast is April
here. Astrology is months:
you are February, or are you
June, and who is
December? Who is books
read in spring, wingspan
between midnight
and mourning
Another starry tree, coastal
counterpoint where magnolia is
a brighter season
peach and pear
are grafted onto the same tree
fear and fat stick
to the same sprained bone
For this adolescent reprise
recycle everything trivial
but this time bring
the eye into sight:
make sight superior
to what is seen
A decade is to look at June
and see April
to look at April
and see February
Relief of repetition
seasons mean again,
one flowering branch suspended
in the half-light of spring
We sat on steps
beneath a tree
No: I walked by
The tree bloomed
and I looked up
--------
"'Virginia Street' is a love poem to...a former self and a beloved other," Hayashida told Poets.org for the Poem-a-Day column, "to resee the past through the lens of the present and to consider the large and small losses that lead to what we consider insight or perspective."
February reasserted itself on Thursday, though it was chilly and drizzly rather than truly cold. I went out early, walked in the park, made a couple of stops, then came home for lunch and work. My mother stopped by with a present -- she found Paul's and my ketubah, the Jewish marriage contract, when she was cleaning out a closet down the basement and got it framed for us, so now it is hanging in our living room.
After catching up on the end of the US women's hockey triumph, for which we were too tired to stay awake, we have spent this evening watching the women's skating long program. I'm sorry the US did not send Ashley Wagner (she wouldn't have medaled but I always love watching her) and I prefer Medvedeva to Zagitova stylistically, but all the top women were terrific. From Washingtonian Lake in Wednesday's heat:
No comments:
Post a Comment