it was only four days
and you barely even spoke to me
but i remember your hand
detailed like a street map
holding me up:
panorama from the tallest
house in the village
so i could see
that between the flowerpots
there’s rows and rows
of dirty laundry
hanging,
that everything
from the backyard
to the distant mountains
stands by at my feet
but i couldn’t afford
a rapid step forward,
that i am an
amateur scientist,
golden compass
in hand and only
at the beginning
of this journey.
and perhaps
my ribs cracked a bit
under the pressure,
but in the path
to whiteness
it was bound to happen
sometime.
Author notes
Dec. 24, 2008
Dedicated to Jure Biechonski - http://www.hypnos.co.uk/hypnomag/biechonski.htm
I have only spent a weekend at a workshop with him and have not had more than two brief conversations with him, but I feel like I've learned some interesting and valuable things about my needs, feelings, and things I need improvement on, from what he said and did during that one weekend.
The title is related to a concrete situation within the workshop, but which I will not disclose.
In a list
A contest entry
- Dear therapist... by RechercheCadaver.
680 points, ended January 6, 13 entries
Silver trophy winner
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest
I've actually put my feelings and effort into this, so PLEASE don't say good job...
Comments
1 - 6 of 6
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Ahh... such a soft poem.
You play your memories out as if we were meant to watch them straight from VHS. Everything seems so clear the way you go about your descriptions, giving away just enough, but never too much. And the emotion of it all plays side-by-side like the audio track.
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that between the flowerpots
there’s rows and rows
of dirty laundry
hanging,
love this part! love this so much...great piece.
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I really love the book allusion in this poem - it made me have that warm glow of understanding at what you were getting at
to me this is one of your moe simplistically beautiful poems - pure and full of optimistic hope and insight 
Polly
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that i am an
amateur scientist,
golden compass
in hand
something about that is really beautiful. i like this poem a lot.
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Excellently executed, the reader can feel the svenghali like soul measuring his words not by quantative but qualitive matter. Liked the reference to the panoramic vista engendered by his hand, as if he opened a portal and there was everything that had been buried or rather swept aside. Like the title, the snow-white tears giving an allusion to purity, of perhaps a feeling of birthing, birthing feeling. Maybe I am rambling.
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Lovely use of imagery, and I really like the lines about the dirty laundry, sometimes we need someone to help us see our situation from a different point of view, because we cannot see the dirty laundry hanging. I found that interesting because usually people hang up clean laundry to dry and not dirty laundry. Very intriguing write, glad you were able to get something important out of the workshop.
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