Having Been Away, What Next?

She returns.  Reluctant yet eager.   Her eyes  have journeyed to new shades of blue,  ears  have heard a wild bird call, lilting voices,  mouth full of sea and rain, the touch of  beechwood, ancient stone.  Senses activated. Pot stirred.  Veil lifted.  Now what?

Having been away, she has transported across oceans through portals of bending time. The curtain briefly flung aside, brilliant light, open window, begins its slow motion closure.  Now what?

Having been away, heart cracked, body stretched, mind cleared and cluttered all at once, she presses her hands to her head, her throat, her ample belly testing her real presence in space, feeling for where she ends and the rest begins. 

In pieces and part of a whole, having been away, the externals more or less apparent, a noisy hunger inside her growls insistent.  A poem asks for more than a list of particulars. A song needs a point.

Random words and an alphabet of images rain down all around her, falling on her personal drought-scorched path, they spell out F O L L O W  M E.  Having been away, this is a welcome gift.  Coming home again, the homing work begins. 

Having been away, in solitude, and surrounded by the clattering of many needy voices, her own among them, she asks “what now?” Arrives on the threshold of yet another doorway to an interior room with a welcome sign on the table.

As a girl, she was lucky to experience that coming home usually meant soft landing.  Having been away, it’s hard to remember that falling-back-into-trusted-arms-feeling.   But trust she will.  It’s what she does.

Having been away, she seeks true home again.  Order and meaning for her many lists, mental photographs, an elegant geometry, the quiet of a convent.

What now is this:  Having been away there is only the present moment, a slow stirring, eyes, ears, mouth, nose, fingers on fire, her mind a-tingle, a light in the window, the unlocked door.


BLR for the Poplar Grove Muse  9/26/12