Poetry

 

 

Eileen Brilliant

Hated By Love

— a line by Robert Creeley in his poem, "The World"

Hated by Love
how haunting this echo, echoing echo
a child of repetition
always giving birth

a child of repetition, over and yes over
yet arriving at the beginning
both goal and curse

Hated by Love
where much goes missing
in the stammer of sounds
or their staccato cousin

where words trample and travel
a leakage of letters
where meaning hidden
is barely found

hated by love
these words a chokehold
where air stops breathing

where the lost may bed
in a barnyard of bustle
where the frolicking does not frolic
but is more than mere motion

where a tentative hold began
with a hand barely open
a body bared

a hold that began with a reaching out
shifts in place
to a reaching in

as the motion slows
the world steadies

as the world steadies
its orbit is found

 

Markings

for Nick

If only the trees did watch over us,
as we lumber and struggle,
wander deep in the forest,
as we wander looking for human markings,
those steps beneath ours

Sounds startle in this place,
should we stay or flee
are we safe, were we ever safe,
is safety our secret lie,
the one we tell ourselves over and over
so we can go on

And on we go, to more
brush and scattered thistle,
other false markings
but still, another approaching dawn,
silent but startling in its
slowly emerging color

 

 

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