Monday, February 4, 2008

Clothes

For ReadWritePoem February 4, 2008
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Dressing

The color, of course,
is important.
For this day
she chooses
a soft pumpkin
to go with her jeans.

First she pushes her arms
up and into the angora.
It tickles a bit
but not too bad.

Then her head
enters the sunset
of her youth
and, for a second
or two, she can’t see.

She knows her head
will pop out
on the other side
of twelve

but, in that darkness,
in that in between
time, halfway
from light to light,

her heart somersaults,
just once, then her eyes
are through the collar.

She pulls all that sunrise
down over the curves
of her tomorrow.

14 comments:

Andy Sewina said...

They tell me Angora's can be hard work - I thought you were going to say 'It tickles her pink.' - anyway...

susan said...

Hope your evening ended better than it started. Thanks for the read.

Anonymous said...

I know that weird feeling you describe here - sometimes I get it when I'm going to give my husband a hug. It's a strange leaping of the heart.

Have you read The Pullover by Julio Cortazar? It's a short story that goes along well with your poem.

I hope all is better on the homefront. Yikes! I'm sorry it was your fault. :(

UL said...

beautifully told, i experienced it right beside you...hope things are well and settled. some days cant be helped but there's always sunshine at the end...just like your poem, hold onto that thought.

paisley said...

i'll be the one that is wearing my shirt pulled just over the top of my head....... i love this....

Anonymous said...

So many great images and descriptions here, I was right there.....your poetry has a real immediacy that I love.

Anonymous said...

I liked that last stanza. Sometimes I too have this feeling. From light to dark to light again.

Crafty Green Poet said...

I really enjoyed reading this, you take us on a journey all in that simple movement of dressing

L said...

loved it, i have felt this too.

Rob Kistner said...

My yes -- that was scrumptious... ;)

Nice bit of writing!

Anonymous said...

Sometimes I don't feel like ending the feeling, so I just keep half of my head in my shirt and half of it pulled over my head.

:P

Anonymous said...

Being an indifferent dresser (as Jon Stewart said the other night, my sartorial tendencies were fully formed by the 8th grade), I've had a hard time relating to many of the responses to this theme. But this poem captures an experience and a feeling I've had many times - for some reason, usually with a sweater or sweatshirt, never just with a shirt. Something about the heaviness of the garment triggers it. That, and memories of the Iliad and Agamemnon's fate.

Deb said...

I love the idea of dressing. This is such a marvelous poem.

(I don't think I needed the last stanza. Just my impresssion.)

Hope the bad day is a faint memory.

Anonymous said...

You knitted a time-tunnel there! Cool.

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