Skip to main content

For CB & MB

For Christine and Mama Brooks:
(April 8, 2011)

I am a sieve.
My calloused fingertips worn smooth
grapple, grasp, grab
swift and
fleeting time
and life
and is
that slip
finely through.

Could I catch
but one grain
I would raise it high.
No, I would hold it close…
and covet it.
Elbows and wrists and fingers
pulled in around
the speck cradled
within.


But time and life and is
are mercury
rolling and puddling
before dripping’
dropping
away.

You cast your line,
your pendant, out.
That symbol of Her
Whom I could not reach
For you.
(The holes too wide; she slipped right through.)
You, vigilant, launch her
on to
safer, or calmer, waters.

I failed, my silent prayerful plot,
to halt her flight
to keep her close for you
(the holes too wide; she slipped right through--)


I am but a sieve.
With calloused fingertips worn smooth
which grapple, grasp, grab
the swift and
fleeting time
and life
and is
that slipped
finely through.

And yet, with you
I find
that the gossamers
which thread my mitts
do catch
chips, splinters, glorious fragments
of diamonds once whole.

And so
I hold
two grains
And I raise these high.
No, I hold them close…
And covet them.
Elbows and wrists and fingers
Pulled in around
The specks of Her, and you, cradled
Within.



Copyright © 2011. Carrie Ellen Campbell. All Rights Reserved. http://carriellencampbell.blogspot.com. Please respect Carrie's intellectual property. Sharing blog posts is permitted, but no part of this material may be copied, downloaded, reproduced, or printed without express written consent. Contact Carrie at: carrieellencampbell@icloud.com.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Shepherd

            “Damned coyotes.” Clifton Ellis followed the blood trail from the sheep shed with no hope of finding the stolen lamb. The ewe bleated, unconsoled. In a terrified frenzy, she’d trampled the lamb’s twin during the coyotes’ last visit. Now, she was alone within the flock.
Post a Comment
Read more

why I write (from November 2011)

If you haven’t felt it for yourself, I’m not sure that you can fully understand. Its presence is not unlike a sixth sense. An unexplained yet apparent awareness of things that simply occurs, sometimes. It’s like that, in the sense that it is temporary, fleeting, and impossible to predict. But, it is also more than that. If you’ve never felt it,  you might relate if I connect it to the feeling  that comes with seeing someone whom you love…unexpectedly, across the room. You glance, and there that person is. Did you feel it? That leap? That flutter? That momentary discombobulation and uneasiness until your mind has time to process that this occurrence is in fact welcome and in fact good. That, that is the feeling, in part.  And then there is something else. This is where I fear I may lose you, but it is this which motivates my fingers on these keys. Let’s see. Have you ever pondered something…just considered, ‘what if?’ long enough to let your heart believe for a seco...
3 comments
Read more

God Goes to School

It goes without mention that rarely do teachers get in their fair shakes when education is the topic of discussion. That, to me, is nonsensical. We dedicate our lives to helping, molding, sculpting, enriching, building, and in some cases preserving and raising the lives of our students. No, we don't do it for the pay, nor do we do it because we cannot do anything else, we do it because it is our passion— our calling --and because we know a simple truth: if we don't, no one else will.  That's what keeps me in education and that's what motivates me to continue my own education, and that's what pushes me stay active in professional advocacy organizations, because if I don't do it, the greatest uncertainty is who will ? 
4 comments
Read more