100 Themes Poem: “Diptych: A Line in the Snow”

Back with another winter poem!

I wasn’t sure I should post this one, just in case I wanted to submit it later for publication. But then I remembered I’d decided my 100 Themes poems would be for sharing. No holding back. 🙂

So here’s my ninth 100 Themes poem, based on the prompt —

CUT

Honestly, it took a while for me to stop thinking of blood. This was another theme that lent itself too quickly to melodramatic interpretations.

After some mulling, I worked the theme into a prose poem in my writing journal — and I hesitate even to call it a prose poem, because it was more of a daydream in stanzas. That was the first draft. It was basically just a weaving together of different images and impressions that had struck me while walking the streets of Novosibirsk.

The main image came from something I saw while on the way to work. It was after a fresh fall of snow. I was walking up my street, and this girl had a stick and was drawing arrows on the sidewalk in front of me. I’m not sure why this made such an impression on me, but I haven’t forgotten it (and likely won’t, now!).

Anyway, later on, I took a second look at the prose poem, found a few gems, and decided it was worth shaping into a proper poem.

Here’s the revised version. 🙂

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Diptych: A Line in the Snow

I.

Fresh snow, a girl out dragging a stick —
one long stripe, two small:
an arrow.

Down the sidewalk, again.
Her arrows I follow from sun-scorched dreams
to lines of poplars, slumbering and dark
as a riddle in wood. I cannot hold; the things I carried
fall away with winter twilight.

She cuts the snow, she cuts the line
between me and something other,
now points her stick and says
this is meeting, this is parting—
this point here.

II.

The girl now drags her stick
across the surface of my heart. Three grooves,
one bloody-bright arrow leading me to all the treasures
I hold already, here in black-gloved hands
weighted with riddles.

Here, she says,
at this point here—you’ve all the beauty
a hundred suns could not outburn.

She drags her stick across my palm
and carves your name, an other’s beauty
I cannot hold, I cannot hold,
an arrowed beauty pointing here
to all the treasures holding me.

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Your turn.

(Share poems — share impressions. I look forward to your comment!)