Dec 2018
LOVE SONG FOR EMILY
(for Emily Dickinson)
You handed me
your eyes
so that I could see
as you saw.
I looking
in wonder
seeing you sew
the world together
in quick little stitches
a perfect embroidery
of knowing
drawing the thread through
& through
until nimble as a needle
I knew as you
knew.
Oh Emily
I was always
in love
with the beauty of your eyes
& how they saw
& said the world
the quick dashes
of your mind
like Braille
to my blindness
the Morse Code
of your thought
leading me through
the labyrinth of you
bound
in a nut
shell
until I arrived
at the beauty of your eyes
and you handed me
your seeing
and...I saw.
(for Emily Dickinson)
You handed me
your eyes
so that I could see
as you saw.
I looking
in wonder
seeing you sew
the world together
in quick little stitches
a perfect embroidery
of knowing
drawing the thread through
& through
until nimble as a needle
I knew as you
knew.
Oh Emily
I was always
in love
with the beauty of your eyes
& how they saw
& said the world
the quick dashes
of your mind
like Braille
to my blindness
the Morse Code
of your thought
leading me through
the labyrinth of you
bound
in a nut
shell
until I arrived
at the beauty of your eyes
and you handed me
your seeing
and...I saw.
* * *
Our English teacher’s voice commanding us to open our books at Emily Dickinson. Doing as I was told...I glanced down shyly at her words looking bravely up at me and immediately at once I fell in love!
Our English teacher’s voice proclaiming “I don’t like teaching this woman…I don’t understand her! ”
Oh Emily, I knew you as you knew me and had already eloped with your mind leaving only the empty shell of a schoolboy for the teacher to shout at! Us laughing...running away together...running through the wild woods of words...gathering words and turning them into the daisy chain of poems.
Our English teacher’s voice commanding us to open our books at Emily Dickinson. Doing as I was told...I glanced down shyly at her words looking bravely up at me and immediately at once I fell in love!
Our English teacher’s voice proclaiming “I don’t like teaching this woman…I don’t understand her! ”
Oh Emily, I knew you as you knew me and had already eloped with your mind leaving only the empty shell of a schoolboy for the teacher to shout at! Us laughing...running away together...running through the wild woods of words...gathering words and turning them into the daisy chain of poems.
