In the morning, I say “I love you” to my wife when I drop her off at work. During the day, there will be moments of joy or sorrow or anger or wonder or disappointment or freedom—all abstractions for states of mind and heart. And, at night, right before he goes to bed, my 17-year-old son says “I love you” to me, and he stands there, waits for me to say “I love you back to him.”
Abstractions haunt us.
Sharon Olds writes about sex . . .
You Kindly
by: Sharon Olds
Because I felt too weak to move
you kindly moved for me, kneeling
and turning, until you could take my breast-tip in the
socket of your lips, and my womb went down
on itself, drew sharply over and over
to its tightest shape, the way, when newborns
nurse, the fist of the uterus
with each, milk, tug, powerfully
shuts. I saw your hand, near me, your
daily hand, your thumbnail,
the quiet hairs on your fingers—to see your
hand its ordinary self, when your mouth at my
breast was drawing sweet gashes of come
up from my womb made black fork-flashes of a
celibate’s lust shoot through me. And I couldn’t
lift my head, and you swiveled, and came down
close to me, delicate blunt
touch of your hard penis in long
caresses down my face, species
happiness, calm which gleams
with fearless anguished desire. It found
my pouring mouth, the3 back of my throat,
and the bright wall which opens. It seemed to
take us hours to move the blonde
creatures so their gods could be fitted to each other,
and then, at last, home, root
in the earth, wing in the air. As it finished,
it seemed my sex was a grey flower
the color of the brain, smooth and glistening,
a complex calla or iris which you
we’re creating with the errless digit
of your sex. But then, as it finished again,
one could not speak of a blossom, or the blossom
was stripped away, as if, until
that moment, the cunt had been clothed, still,
in the thinnest garment, and now was bare
or more than bare, silver wet-suit of
matter itself gone, nothing
there but the paradise fall. And then
more, that cannot be told—may be,
but cannot be, things that did not
have to do with me, as if some
wires crossed, and history
or war, or the witches possessed, or the end
of life where happening in me, or I was
in a borrowed body, I knew
what I could not know, did-was-done-to
what I cannot do-be-done-to, so when
we returned, I cried, afraid for a moment
I was dead, and had got my wish to come back,
once, and sleep with you, on a summer
afternoon, in an empty house
where no one could hear us.
I lowered the salt breasts of my eyes
to your mouth, and you sucked,
then I looked at your face, at its absence of unkindness,
its giving that absence off as a matter
I cannot name, I was seeing not you
but something that lives between us, that can live
only between us. I stroked back the hair in
pond and sex rivulets
from your forehead, gently, raked it back
along your scalp,
I did not think of my father’s hair
in death, those oiled paths, I lay
along your length and did not think how he
did not love me, how he trained me not to be loved.
Olds is dealing with a lot of big abstractions in this poem—love and sex and sadness and passion. Most poets and writers will tell you that they write in order to know what they think. That’s what Olds is doing here, capturing this very intimate moment between herself and her significant other, deciphering its meaning for herself and her readers..
The abstractions that has been haunting me this week is grief. On Tuesday, I received an email from a good friend, telling me that his wife (and good friend to my family, as well) had transitioned from this life. She had been struggling for about three years with rheumatoid arthritis which caused a very rare respiratory condition. The news of her death, while not completely unexpected, still cast a pall over the rest of the week for me.
No matter what I type here, I will never be able to communicate what a light she was in the world. On occasion, my wife and I had dinner and drinks with these friends. The thing that always struck me about our meetups was that my friend’s wife never complained or spoke about her health issues. In fact, more than anything else, she just seemed annoyed by the physical limitations of her illness. Yet, in my mind, she always remained vibrant and engaged and full of joy. I’m sure she had her dark moments during the last year or so, but she still enjoyed a glass of wine, sweet potato fries, and good conversation.
That’s how I’ll always remember her—laughing, loving life, cherishing friends and family. I grieve that I will no longer be able to see her smile, hear her laugh. And I grieve for my friend, who is simply one of the best people I’ve ever had the privilege to know.
That’s my abstraction for tonight—loss and sadness.
Saint Marty wrote a poem for tonight, based on the following prompt from December 8 in The Daily Poet:
Begin a poem “Dear Time” or “Dear Eternity” but instead of continuing in the realm of abstraction, make your letter specific and concrete. Perhaps you are unhappy with these concepts. Voice your opposition! If you get stuck, include one or more of the following words in your letter: skin, geography, regret, tugboat, pudding, fibrous, pumice.
Democracy
by: Martin Achatz
This December, I festoon my front porch
with white lights.
Down the street, my neighbor’s front porch
blazes red, green, blue, gold.
I had lunch with a friend today:
a burger, hold the pickles and mustard.
My friend’s burger dripped mustard,
extra pickles littered his plate.
I watch a snowstorm approach on radar
like unwanted relatives at Christmas.
A poet friend waxes her skis, puts them
in her car for tomorrow morning’s glide.
My wife sleeps on her side, breath
easy as sunlight.
My friends wife chews each bite of air
as if it’s her last.
Tonight, my backyard is a blank
sheet of Foolscap.
By dawn, rabbits will have scribbled
haiku on it all the way to the alley.
