Some mornings I reckon
it’s gonna be frosty;
nose-tingling hoary,
unsafe to walk on
but today, before a new dawn,
I came out my front door
and the sigh of a zephyr
came up from the earth.
Unusual near winter
that the ground sends a balm,
a hot breath, an out breath,
a generous kiss,
rekindling my centre
to let out his warmth.
Nod a bottle at a brittle glass
and fizzy lemonade arises,
toxicates a nostril,
titillates and fills:
more than ‘satisfactory’,
popping at their birth-point,
bubbles sharp and piquant
instigate a sneeze:
higher than high,
brighter than light,
way beyond planets,
ripple and lap
up to emotion,
quivering lips.
See a smile
of mirth and mischief
when he leads
his laggard brother
in a march
from car to pub and bar;
a glance suggests how
fun will surely follow.
Track in-step
until he opens up
his arms with cheek
and, like a tuning fork,
stands, vibrates and hullabaloos
‘Happy Birth-day toooo you!!!’
Same routine,
up at 5;
forgives himself
for last night’s
misdemeanors.
After all,
it’s only words!
Breakfast mind
plots away
and then comes back
to coffee and a roll.
Through a glass, he sweeps
a gaze at folly â€" every being
and himself - and feels
a sudden thud of peace.
Today I walked past loads of doors
and, do you know, I had an urge
to reach and turn every handle;
see what lurks on the other side.
Something within us loves
hidden rooms, locked;
a key, a push, a creak,
a prisoner running free,
but tonight
when earth turns;
doors will bolt,
locked like clams,
holding tight
onto watery dreams.
We had a chat
about a rat;
yours a giant,
mine - a tyrant.
We made a jigsaw
like a sunset;
an orange (I saw)
you saw red
but only when my fruit
and your new fangled colour
merge do we, in truth,
create an apple’s figure
- and the rat, of course,
was a very helpful chap.
Imagine looking out
from way inside yourself
as a baby, or a boy with
Down’s:
without any crazy
constructs, rules.
This place would seem
unsafe â€" a dream!
And your strategy?
How would you get through
a moment, next few minutes, hours,
when you couldn’t hide,
or run, or surf the web a while?
I’ll tell you what â€" you’d smile!
I jump on a train
but every seat’s full;
I buzz up and down
like an ant in an anthill
looking for my place;
trying, trusting god,
but every gaze avoids
my eyes, my eager face
and, deep inside, I pray,
pacing like a dad.
that I will find a friend
that, if I trust today,
a gap will open, smile;
my heart is thudding still.
At a time he sensed was right
up he stood like a reluctant schoolboy
twisting keys in his right hand pocket,
excruciating as an amateur only
can be, and he started to sing, quietly
and human, a song we’d all heard before
- at least for the chorus â€" and he sang the verses,
growing more confident with our support
and do you suppose nothing else happened
that night as he opened his heart like a rainbow?
A melting of oddness and newness ensued
and the tune that was sung by a small Irish crowd
swelled like a wave from our depth, in a song,
and I filled, overflowed, by the beauty I cried.
If you came this way
along a climbing path
you might sit awhile
with all kinds of human notions
until your mind eventually
slowed, senses awoke,
and took in that mammoth
mountain in front â€" bathed
into sunlight and darting
with swifts.
The wonder of it
could make you kneel and pray,
overwhelmed and tearful,
until nothing arises
and fear itself flies
with a tremulous influx
of Love.
A leaf like a slowly closing hand
drops off
a great mother of a
tree - letting go
(irresistibly
it lets go)
in a shutterdown
of winter’s paler light.
How wonderful like a butterfly
to flutter, tumble, still;
only caught by wind - not knowing
that the lattice bark has started on a spree
with sun and rain and waving snow,
of soundness and repair.
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.
Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.
Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.
Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.
Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.
You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.
Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?
Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.
It was a perfect language—
rarefied, precise, and all my own.
At three I spoke it fluently
to dust motes in prismatic light,
and to the bear who sang Brahms
each night as headlights prowled
across my bedroom walls.
Gillican gave voice to the night
my father scooped me out of bed
to see the northern lights,
to the witch who lived in granny's cellar,
who hid in ripples of sea-green glass.
It could evoke the ethereal spirit
of the stray cat we took in, moth-grey
fur in clumps, three legs, half a tail.
If Gillican had words for loss or death
I don't remember what they were.
I lost a red boot—stuck in the mud
when I fled from a giant bumblebee—
but it happened in a dream.
Animals died—old ewes, frumpy
in their tattered coats after shearing.
There was a word for orphans—lambs
who nuzzled our knees after we fed them—
and an expression for the black-eyed guppies
whose mother ate them up.
I made up a lovely name
for the tortoises from Galápagos,
the ones I sat on at the Reptile Gardens.
I saw them again last summer—
all of them were still alive, thriving
on melons and prickly pears
eaten in slow motion.
JANE MCKINLEY
The Georgia Review
Fall 2010
Thank Heavens for Angels
The skies are free from clouds,
On this late Saturday evening.
A boy sits hugging his knees,
Enduring the cool October breeze.
The ocean waves crash ashore,
Beating against the rocks below.
On this cliff standing tall,
He prepares to take a fall.
In love he is with a beautiful girl,
Now to tell her how he feels.
Panic bells ring around his ears,
As day dreams bring him to tears.
She found him sitting alone,
Wondering if anything was wrong.
A fake smile is all he could do,
While contemplating an 'I love you'
Before he could turn to speak,
She hushed his quivering lips.
Deep into his eyes she stared,
And told him how much she cared.
He apologizes to God in his mind,
'Sorry God, I'm stealing an angel'
He can see Heaven in her eyes,
It takes away all his butterflies.
He manages to say 'I love you'
She smiles and returns the words.
He looks at the Heavens above,
As he kisses his one true love.
