Friday, January 13, 2012

WRITING IN WINTER

Last week the lovely Jeannine Atkins wrote a post I adore about white space and courage. She included in her post an image of an ice skater.

I've been thinking about that ice skater and how she is a metaphor for writing.

And so I put it in a poem:



Writing in Winter
        -for Jeannine

Blades slice
easy 8s
across ice pond

You breathe
teeter
weave

arms tight
flung w i d e
tight again

Just you
with your tingly
truths

your deliberate
unmittened
heart

and a whirl
of white
waiting

--Irene Latham 

Wishing all of you easy 8s and the happiest of Poetry Fridays! Don't forget to visit Tara at A Teaching Life has Roundup.

19 comments:

  1. I love this one....the match-up of white space/ice/truth is perfect.

    Hope all is well, Irene!

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  2. Oh, Irene, It's drizzly and gray outside but you've just warmed my heart -- and let's hope it becomes a "deliberate and unmittened" one. I love that description! ! I feel so happy to have inspired you, and it reminds me of all the goodness of friendship and creativity and how today is a good day to write a poem. xo

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  3. Breathtakingly beautiful, Irene! The "deliberate unmittened heart" slays me. Wonderful to see the ripples of inspiration from one poet to the next.

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  4. You really capture the movement of skating in this, Irene! I love swirl of it, and I especially like the ending. What a special gift for Jeannine!

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    1. Thank you, Tabatha- it was a special gift that Jeannine gave ME. Happy day to you!

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  5. I loved that post & printed it out to keep at the computer. This is lovely, a look, for me, at introspection with 'just you with your tingly truths'. Thank you.

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    1. I love that you printed Jeannine's post! I look forward to what words it brings YOU. Thanks for reading.

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  6. Beautiful, Irene! I'm echoing enchantment with "your tingly
    truths" and "your deliberate unmittened heart" - what wondrous, easy 8's turns of phrases. Thanks for sharing!

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    1. Robyn, "echoing enchantment" belongs in a poem! thanks for reading. xo

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    1. Thank you Julie! Of course the only ice ponds this far south are domed with climate-control. :) Thanks for reading!

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  8. I was going to comment on the wonderful combo of "tingly truths" myself, but the others beat me to it. So much of poetry to me is finding those killer combinations that say exactly what you want the way you want.

    And it is fun, Jama, to see one poem inspire another. That's the way life should be!

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    1. Yes, Ed, to poems inspiring other poems, poets inspiring other poets! I want to know YOUR tingly truths. Thanks for reading.

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  9. Nice! I love the spacing on flung wide.

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  10. I've never learned to skate. Or bike, for that matter. Your poem makes me feel that I missed out on a lot. :( Lovely lines. :)

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  11. Ohhhhh, I love the "unmittened heart!" Lovely!

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  12. Irene, I admire the recognition of the risk that comes with writing. We venture out onto the blank white page like the skater onto the ice, and no matter how easy we might make the figure 8s appear, there are always dark currents muttering underneath and places where the ice is thin. Without the risk, it wouldn't really matter, would it?

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  13. I, too, am swooning over "unmittened heart." And how lovely to write a beautiful poem for Jeannine who feeds so many of us. It's so unlonely in here; thank you for the reminder and the poem too. a.

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  14. Oh...that "unmittened heart"...vulnerable, but brave.

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Your thoughts?