First, it’s peach
crossed by a double u of wings.
The sun hidden by a pearl horizon.
Amber bronzes toast
the gray scudding cumulus,
bleeds to pink becoming magenta
as the darkness gathers
in the charcoal trees.
The edge of frost,
the smell of snow
creeps into wood smoke.
Feet crush summer underfoot
as leaves gather against wind breaks
find themselves parked curbside in bags.
The letters with your smell taint
the advertisements beneath the mail slot.
I can see you pressing the back end
of the pen against your lower lip as you
try to taste each word before pinning
it to the page. Job, weather conditions,
transportation strikes. another assignment
I am left with an empty bed and late night TV.
Breakfast is a bowl of cold cereal
hot coffee and silence. I never knew
how much I could miss the sound of your breathing.
How much I don’t want to read
the comics and sports page without interruption.
I text I love you and feel foolish,
kiss my fingertips and touch your e-mail.
Please come home soon, my world
is too large to fit comfortably
when you are not in it.
10:22 PM
11/27/08
Alexandria, VA
A contest entry
- distance: by Randomly Beautiful.
700 points, ended November 29, 2008, 6 entries
Gold trophy winner
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest
Please tell me what you think, what it makes you feel, how you are moved.
Comments
1 - 25 of 25
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STUNNING! I think I must feel this way about Oregon too... {I didn't drop off the face of the earth, just went "home" for a week that turned into 3 months... then drug my feet back to WA. while my heart doth protest} You are still the master of elegant imagery in my book... simply put this is one gorgeous poem!!!
Ithy [Are you still working on submitting a book...? You had better be! AND how are you in general? Seeing any improvements thereof? I haven't forgotten, ya know... ]
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The left eye has had a shunt put in it to relieve the pressure. I have got back a large chunk of my site.
There is still more work to be done.
I got one of my poems, I think -- it isn't published yet, into an anthology. It is one of mine about my son, Graham.
Glad you enjoyed this piece of the ache of fall and separation. It showed up because of the sunset I watched on the way to my sister's house for Thanksgiving and the sound of blue somewhere in the back of my head.
Very, very happy to have you back in this electronic wilderness. You have been missed.
Love, Tom B.
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I can see you pressing the back end
of the pen against your lower lip as you
try to taste each word before pinning
it to the page.
yummmmmmmmy.
This write is absolutely delicious.
I can see clearly why it would win gold, and make no mistake, I didnt miss one tiny sigh of longing.
I can remember dimly how this felt, although it's only coming on in waves.
The ending of this is just choking me up and making things all blurry.
Excellent
Love,
jin
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We want to be surrounded by the noises of those we love, even if it is so we can complain about it. We forget to easy. I wanted to mix understanding and the ache of distance together because it, in my book, heightens the senses. One of the reasons I like letters as opposed to e-mails is things written are always more likely to be directly from the heart than those things that are filtered through a machine. It may be, just, me -- but that is the way I see it.
Love, Tom B.
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Wow
this is wonderful.. the imagery in the beginning is so beautiful!!! 'pearl horizon' 'amber bronzes toast' 'charcoal trees' i felt like i was shroomin' ha It's a naked poem. I loved it... and now I'm gonna put on Van Morrison CRAZY LOVE
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Been a long, long time since I did any psycodelics. The colors were what I saw on my way to my sisters for Thanksgiving. Van Morrison at any time is a cause for celebration.
Love, Tom B. -
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I never saw colors until recently, the past 3 years that is, now I see them in everything.. I imagined a full piece band traveling on an empty 18 wheeler while driving across Pennsylvania for Thanksgiving.. the 2 passengers in the car jumped on the wave with and saw it with me but I reeeallly saw it.. you should set aside some time to trip soon
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How right you are, Tomis. I like this one very much in it's reflections of everyday miracles. It's vibrant with poignancy and vivid in sensory visuals. A sense of vastness permeates mind.
But it's the intimacy of things shared which clutch me by the heart and make me bite my lower lip to keep my eyes from welling out of sentiment. So much is taken for granted until it goes missing...and then we know what our gifts have been.
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This is one of those contrasts between the macro-cosum and the micro-cosum. They move us in the same, but different ways. We don't know what we have till its gone and sometimes we are even available to recognize it before it happens. I am always surprised by how much people don't realize that it is all the little things that make the big things happen. I am rambling.
Love, Tom B.
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without going in to it too much....but the first stanza was very sensual to me.... that place of nudge of longing, I think.... and then the poem drug me along through the ache. This is more than the woman itself...this is Mother Earth to me.
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You were the first to see it. The ache in the heart is not just for a partner but for a sense of being in a universe that moves on without him. I got the image in the first stanza watching sunset as I drove to my sisters for Thanksgiving. The rest wrote itself when I got home.
Love, Tom B.
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You know you can paint a pic don't you...? Now it makes me wanna go back and look at the contest to see what motivated you to write such fabulosity.
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the motivation: I found myself describing the sunset as we headed to one of my sisters for Thanksgiving. It stayed with me till that night. The last two verses may in part be because I was too sated with family and feast to want to talk about it anymore. I don't really know.
Love, Tom B.
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reading you is never boring. you take our hands and we fly through swirls and twirls of poetry - it is always breathtaking, Tom. Your love affair with words shows greatly in this write, and I think the Gold is well-deserved. Love, Lane
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I think it was the finger tip kisses to the e-mail. This was a study. I enjoyed the setting of the sunset, fall againt all the mundane minutesha (sp?) of the everyday when what makes it all worthwhile is away. Both contrast and heightening.
I remain fascinated by feelings. Their depth and run intrigue me.
Love, Tom B.
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"The sun hidden by a pearl horizon.
Amber bronzes toast
the gray scudding cumulus,
bleeds to pink becoming magenta
as the darkness gathers
in the charcoal trees."
The hues of life and love are brilliantly painted in this work of poetry. I don't quite know what I would do if me and hubby were separated for any length of time. I am sure my emotions would pan out much like you've written.
CONGRATULATIONS ON EARNING THE GOLD CUP!
Much Love ♥
Renee
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This started on the trip to my sisters for Thanksgiving. I was watching the sky shift its colors as we headed over there. I was amazed by the pearl skyline as the clouds picked up the color of the sunset. Maybe I went to the lonely because I was so full of feast and family
Love, Tom B.
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Oh my...maybe you have taught more than anyone else about the difference between the written and spoken word...yet maybe it's /its...not at all sure about the slang double u of wings...either metaphorically or visually...pink/magnenta/charcoal have too close a proximity for a traffic/sage like change for me...even if parked in kerb side bags...then you add the usage of taint...ouch...the smell of taint...either a semi-colon after strikes or perhaps capitalize another...
it's only at the end that you acknowledge the distance felt...and then only because of the the self...there is no sense of togetherness...no key of we...only what is dismissed and accepted...you must know by now by now that I wouldn't listen to a personal/private rendition if I didn't appreciate your creativity...also that I am never going to say anything other than I feel...however...congratulations on the golden globe...and you will always enchant me with with your voice...
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Perfumed letters against come ons. I think taint is correct. Loneliness is always personal because it becomes a study in a an ego casting about for its own importance.
Love, Tom B.
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One of your very best. I love the images in this.
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Thank you. I wanted to set the backdrop of sunset and then catch the ache of separation. It is one of those good bad aches that sharpen our sense of appreciation.
Love, Tom B.
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SIgh~
The imagery is so vivid here that I can feel your movements and even taste the pain of longing and inhale the pure scent of love...
You my dear are such a poet who speaks from the heart/...
I love it
Lynda
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Thanks, sis. I wanted to set the scene and create that feeling and then bring forward the event. Absence may make the heart grow fonder but it doesn't lessen the ache of missing the one you love. So much of the joy is in the sharing. You get use to rituals and times of being together. When they are not there, the empty sets in.
Love,
Tom B.
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Ah the fresh smell of love across a table in the morning and so softly emotive when only one is there thinking on it. Beautiful dear poet C
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Call it distance, call it aloneness, call it what ever you want. We want the one we love to be close enough for touch. We want to see the response as it happens. There is a quality of aliveness that comes when they are present unlike anyother. Oh, hell I can't say it, read the poem.
Love, Tom B.
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