Another Kneeling
We wave goodbye to the loud sun with a quickened trot from car
to shade under a cinder block canopy slathered dry with the fairest paint.
Minutes blur because our minds stop listening to the buzz of time’s convention
when called to gather our bodies in stacked rows of obedience.
We kneel and I recall the caress of soft carpet on my forehead and silence
the hunger that bellows at my vision’s periphery, craving distraction.
The speaker echoes sounds that run through a stream of communal memory;
they have tried to dig into the cracked soil of my remembrance.
When the gathering ceases, I flee from doubt into the music of the sun.
Afras, I love the music of those first lines -- it's all concrete, musical, and active. When I come to "time's convention," however, I'm in the realm of euphemism. What is "time's convention"? What is meant here? What is happening when the figures move into "stacked rows of obedience"? I think this is prayer. The memory of the carpet signifies that. What is the hunger? Is it something visual? There is much compressed here-- faith and doubt, ritual and escape. I like this very much. I think bits of it could be more clear. You certainly have an ear for the music of language!
ReplyDelete"When the gathering ceases, I flee from doubt into the music of the sun." ++++++++++ love it
ReplyDeleteI think this is a fantastic poem, Afras! It is extremely musical, as was stated in the previous comments, and it creates beautiful imagery as a result. My only point of confusion was in the second to last line: "they have tried to dig into the cracked soil of my remembrance." I was a bit unclear as to who the "they" was that you were referring. It may be worth adjusting something in the earlier lines to make the pronoun a bit more of a direct reference.
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