Two works written in response to this Sunday's prompts: "it would be fine if..." inspired by a poem called It Would Be Fine by Rosemary Starace, and "art."
If, And, Or
if I walked out the door tomorrow
and became a tree
the tall, sturdy kind
with its roots grown deep
and its head in the clouds
branches outflung, tender-tipped with buds
that would become leaves
that would become producers of oxygen
that I could breathe in if I didn’t become
a tree,
if, instead, I became a bird
that might alight on my hand
if I stretched it out like a tree branch,
if I could be bird, and branch and hand
and breathe
it would be fine.
If I could be a cloud
that sails the blue sea of the sky,
that plies the ground with rain;
if I could be the wind
that moves the cloud
if I could shine down, shine on, shine through,
be a sun of benevolence,
a sun of vast light,
a sun of strident heat,
it would be fine
if I pulled the fallen rain up
to fill another cloud
that might water a tree
which I might become
when I walk out the door tomorrow.
Seasonal Art
On the mat by the door
the winter boots wait—
a welter of rubber and suede and felt,
one small blue boot
tipped over like an abandoned boat
left to wait for the tide.
A jumble of footwear
made into art by disuse,
a hodge-podge of color,
and fabric, and shape,
a still life until
it snows.
