~
there are no round corners
my imagination is akimbo
jolts of current spark within context
without setting light
What to do?
~
I gather the dexterity needed
and carry it to the scales
only to find
it weighs more than I do
~
my skin is transparent
I employ a magnifying glass
angling towards the sun
the beam passes right through me
blazing and unhindered
~
I bulk up
looking for muscular advantage
and slip easily into the crowd
our words are hot but cool off fast
leaving nuggets between my teeth
~
I turn invisible
and pass easily through the crowd
floating a few inches off the ground
I still stub my toe
while leaving no footprints
~
I want to weep like a child
but worrying about the leak
I put duct tape on my face
covering my mouth
leaving space for my eyes
~
awkward and exploding
my imagination
is no longer rooted
in safe ground
I am uncomfortable
I am vulnerable
profusely sweating
in the slipstream
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
painting and poem: Jana H. White
Poetry of Light 
Just full of beautiful images
One rite after another
Simply …..
Good morning Jana
As always Sheldon
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Morning to you too, Sheldon, And thanks!….if it were a graceful process I’d call it a conscious unfolding. Sometimes it’s more like an elevator going too fast…Hahaha
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I like the elevator idea
It’s like when I’m in the moment
And there’s nothing else around me
Great to hear someone else saying it
As always Sheldon
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Strange, that claustrophobic awkwardness that sometimes comes unbidden, almost shockingly so, perhaps? Then again, maybe I am reading all this through a different template altogether. Lovely painting – is that a detail or the complete work, may I ask, Jana?
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Morning Hariod! I’m not sure if I can master consciously coming apart “gracefully” every time. For me, jumping on the train as its leaving is often the most direct way to new discovery. Sometimes I’m in the economy car with the goats and chickens!
The painting is a wee small one. 5″x7″ painted years ago. Thank you my dear!
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Such an evocative piece Jana. Both awkward and voluptuous .
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hahaha….exactly how it felt! Thanks Mark. Exuberant as well…landing on my feet running.
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I had to dissipate while reading this – then I got it
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You crack me up Mark….it’s those elevators going too fast that will get me every time. That is until the door opens….
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… what, and you realise you’re stuck between two floors; is that it?
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Long enough to write the poem….
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now that’s something to admire: shall she jump, shall she crawl – nope, neither, she’s got the notebook out, and she’s scribbling? As Bruce said to Carrie after she’d shimmied down the pipe: “good soldier; good soldier”
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powerful Jana – I really like the painting as well – what materials does that involve?
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Thanks Nathan. The painting is an older one using plastic wrap for texturing a gel medium and then I like using Golden acrylics.
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The image is somewhere between Kahlil Gibran and Odilon Redon and then there’s the duct tape. Some jarring and marring with the meditative bliss. Quite striking.
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I like that Steven…a highly textured response!
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Both beautiful.
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As always, thank you Richard…..
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In Horus daze everyone was painted akimbo on the sacred walls of the Nile…your painting too, memories of camel bells and illusions of water. wonderfully simple in its complexity.
When you’re Alice Through the Looking Glass like in this poem I enjoy sharing your white water reflections, but more, I just want to hug you and tell you its all just a dream…
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“…it’s all just a dream” LOL … that is, until I try waking up within the dream. “Whose dream are you dreaming?” the Cheshire cat must have asked. I’m back on the borderline riding the rough edges. Poetry is everywhere. Words are dense as boulders, ephemeral as flowers….sweating, scented and never discreet. Thanks for the hug…!
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jana, with this poem the word “anomie” keeps coming to mind. it’s a scary poem for me. some of the images may show up in my dreams tonight. but i do get that being vulnerable can lead to some interesting experiences. (yes, we know about “interesting.”) “my skin is transparent” is such a strong image and central to the work.
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The transparency, Michael, was forced upon me a long time ago and has now become a gift …but still…one not easy to reconcile. I suppose this dark and darker fertility, this ground of chaos and creation, might appear like “anomie” ( a new word for me…! ) There is a certain frightening “weightlessness” inherent. I try not to shy from the heart of fire (one poetic face. I’m sure it has many)…. my resistance causing far more incidental heat. Thank you Michael…for your response, our dialogue… xxoo
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I’ve just spent about an hour trying to write a comment about your recent work. Unfortunately speechless doesn’t really say or capture what I’m feeling at all… and the pile of words… well, neither did they. Just keep dancing and being danced Jana. You’re drawing and creating from a very cool place.
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I think the only time I have an argument anymore, Chris, is with words…. I hear you there…and so appreciate your presence here!
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The images here were so rich, so unexpected, but so inviting to enter into. They left me feeling all we can do is haunt the lives we are given. And what could be more tangible than that?
Michael
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You’ve afforded me a deeper perspective, Michael, using the word “haunting” and all it implies. Out of body? It was an interesting juxtaposition to the poem (so lost and finding at the same time) since it’s now so clear that each birthing, of every nature, follows corridors of resistance until the inevitable stage of transition… fierce and dramatic, when bingo! We are born. We are alive! We know we are our body, not simply inhabit it. We breath air, wail from our center, kick and stretch into our existence…newborns every time.
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“I still stub my toe
while leaving no footprints”
Now that’s what I call genius. My gracious.
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Caught this one, huh? Thank you Faith, for leaving your footprint here!
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surgery
~
haglund’s deformity
my stitches came out last week
a heal with tracks
along a bulb
~
tensor bandages
stretching
time
~
comparing
flexibility of ankles
finding pain’s starting point
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dancing in the New Year
spinning in ecstasy
exiting in injury
plantar fascilitis
It’s a heel of a year….
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I’m finding time
to become
~
grounded
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How do you do it? This effortless joining together of words so that they tell us such tales as dreams are made of.
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Thanks Chris…I guess I’m just literally rolling with the punches. Kind of like a documentary. Life comes on fast sometimes….!
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I love these words.
my imagination
is no longer rooted
in safe ground
I am uncomfortable
I am vulnerable
As I read I related some of what you wrote to dissociation. You may not have been talking about that but it’s how I saw it. I could see, me, not you, moving through the crowd, changing every time help or solid ground came along. No comfort from the sun, your words cool off. You float yet you are still hurt.
When weeping as a child you covered your mouth, not your eyes. The leak seems more like words than tears.
Wow. I’m moved.
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Poems often come at me full on…or up or down through me with enthusiasm. I wrestle with them with the desire for relationship, to get closer, to touch. And …to be touched. After trauma a person needs the practice. Your insight about this one is right on…it was inspired by “words”. Someone told me I do “awkward” well. Hit a nerve. And all the layers upon layers of other stuff came in but words really are the doorway I’ll walk through every time to have a better look. They allow me to be vulnerable. To express how I’m feeling in that moment or I’ll burst…
Thank you for the dialogue! And for relating to this one. That disassociation? It’s become a tool. Shown me worlds I’d never known existed. For me the trick was in learning my “mind” was in my whole body, especially my heart, not just in my head. And the moon and its phases which seem to bring up all the peaks and hollows I need to balance. Thanks again for reaching out…xxxooo
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