they will chop in little pieces
what you thought you were
almost greeting you at the food bank
or in the grocery store
or looking somewhere else
when you try to meet their gaze
to say to them look there's nothing to be
afraid of here:
sudden poverty isn't catching.
or maybe it isn't about
the fact that you're down there
and they're not.
never have you wished more
for the three good wishes unwasted.
as it is
I dream of letting go.
of occasions fit for the frothy dress
the velvet bandeau
the one of yellow sapphires set or of
the early snows;
of space, lodged so far from allthis
so that it almost chokes the soul
imagining the way back
from canyon to canyon
as in the intricate equations
of our major scientists
seeking the circumference
of the vastness between us
when neither heat nor light nor any human sound
comes to us in waves anymore
in the luxuriant afternoons...
harness the polar winds the frozen over smiles
I say to them from my cartesian plane
where it echoes not and the high winds rise.
all this is how it seems said no glittering fairies
while i, the I I was and am, can barely stand, must flee
the caustic breakroom stare, the looming severances of pay.
the cost of living this way is remaining yourself
in God, regardless, my adequate angels say: o search, oh search
for the boat of dreams.
and slip away.
mary angela douglas 19 september 2017
what you thought you were
almost greeting you at the food bank
or in the grocery store
or looking somewhere else
when you try to meet their gaze
to say to them look there's nothing to be
afraid of here:
sudden poverty isn't catching.
or maybe it isn't about
the fact that you're down there
and they're not.
never have you wished more
for the three good wishes unwasted.
as it is
I dream of letting go.
of occasions fit for the frothy dress
the velvet bandeau
the one of yellow sapphires set or of
the early snows;
of space, lodged so far from allthis
so that it almost chokes the soul
imagining the way back
from canyon to canyon
as in the intricate equations
of our major scientists
seeking the circumference
of the vastness between us
when neither heat nor light nor any human sound
comes to us in waves anymore
in the luxuriant afternoons...
harness the polar winds the frozen over smiles
I say to them from my cartesian plane
where it echoes not and the high winds rise.
all this is how it seems said no glittering fairies
while i, the I I was and am, can barely stand, must flee
the caustic breakroom stare, the looming severances of pay.
the cost of living this way is remaining yourself
in God, regardless, my adequate angels say: o search, oh search
for the boat of dreams.
and slip away.
mary angela douglas 19 september 2017
