Someone, Please, Make it About Something

Photo Credit: MastaBaba Flickr via Compfight cc-by-nc.

Before words blacken page,
this could be about a wish:
Grant us the calm of the curled dog,
for forgiveness:
Folks fret too much,

Or a hopscotch game:
Chalked on cracked Harlem sidewalk
that is really metaphor
for aspects, random
and planned, of a hard life—
Hop, twist, land, count, lose
but call it win,

Or sound:
An ax on oak,
a bleating sheep drifting
to a long-ago castle keep window
No more than slotted gap
in sturdy stone wall.

Here on blackened page
words may swerve
down to water’s salty edge:
Renewal,
into fields of yellow flowers:
the mind’s eye,
in front of headlamps
of an oncoming truck:
Death,
up to scads
of scudding stratocumulus:
Prayer, dream,
Risk,

At any time.

Now it ends
at our say so.

Categories Poetry

Pamela Hobart Carter loves Seattle as much for its water and mountains as for its bustle and creativity. She explores the Emerald City daily while walking her dog. Carter used to be a teacher who wrote on the side. Now she is a writer who teaches on the side.

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