Thursday, April 16, 2009

Ode to Finitude

What follows is a poem I wrote just after completing the first draft of my previous post, which I hadn't been at all satisfied with. The title of the piece is rather self-explanatory. I hope you enjoy, and that you've been taking full and joyful advantage of April as National Poetry Month!



Ode to Finitude

Limit, you goddess, daughter of
        Form, overcome me, overtake me
        again with sweet extremity!
Rope me to the glory of your
        monstrous bones, rigging
        for the dancing world--
I will dance, my feet hard and rolling
        because I have feet; I will
        slap my hands to your gusty
rhythm, because I have hands; I will sing
        from a quivering throat, vibration
        mother of voice, because
I have voice--I will praise you, my
        maligned divinity, my shapely
        sublime, Limit, I will run
my tongue along your edges,
        I will kiss your every limb,
        for I have tongue, lips and limbs,
my own sweet utter skin, I have
        a wide pale body with which to
        billow before Spirit, grandmother
Mind, old Ever-Present, too ancient for
        dust. I have known her, too,
        dreaming, she is soft and fat with the dark
openness of space--but you! Limit,
        my lovely, my little boat,
        we will skip, we will go sailing
quick and bright
        over the long silent waters of the Real.

6 comments:

  1. Very beautiful Ali!

    I wrote a post a few years back (on a blog long ago and far far away) about the importance of finitude. Your poem explores the profundity much better than my post did. :)

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  4. (let's try that without the poor spelling this time)

    You're welcome! Usually I don't leave such succinct comments, but I wasn't sure what else to say about it. Perhaps I should have left the best compliment a poet can give another: 'I wish I wrote this.' AND 'I remembered it and came back to look twice.' Good luck with your work.

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