Reinvention Week 5: Poetic Interlude

For a vault of audio to stimulate innovation, click here. For more on creativity from Adam, use search field (top left) or click on keywords (bottom right) on his Innovation on my Mind blog.


Let Me Tell You Something

What if I lifted both of my arms
up from the sides of my body
dug my elbows into the wall
and catapulted myself forward, feet first
toward you?
Would that lure you from the whirl?

What if you were distracted by a fly near your eye
and you turned to see my body falling on its spine
my body crawling one vertebra at a time
toward you?
Would that disturb your pattern of chatter?

Let me tell you something:

I would like to tear the colors off my skin
and spread their yolk over my face
until I spit rainbows

I would like to turn to the wall,
arch my body
and throw back my head,
until you see the spidery reflections of my lashes on the ceiling,
until they fall like warm sugar into your eyes
and become questions you already know
the answers to

I would like
to love you

~Adam Shames

A sampling of Mary Oliver

Time for a quick dip into the poetic vault of Mary Oliver, the great American poet, starting with one of my favorite poems and then a few excerpts to spur your creative imagination. All of these can be found in her New and Selected Poems. Happy anniversary, Mom and Dad!

The Journey
One day you finally knew

what you had to do, and began,

though the voices around you

kept shouting

their bad advice--

though the whole house

began to tremble

and you felt the old tug

at your ankles.

"Mend my life!"

each voice cried.

But you didn't stop.

You knew what you had to do,

though the wind pried

with its stiff fingers

at the very foundations,

though their melancholy

was terrible.

It was already late

enough, and a wild night,

and the road full of fallen

branches and stones.

But little by little,

as you left their voices behind,

the stars began to burn

through the sheets of clouds,

and there was a new voice

which you slowly

recognized as your own,

that kept you company

as you strode deeper and deeper

into the world,

determined to do

the only thing you could do--

determined to save

the only life you could save.

from Rice

I don't want you just to sit down at the table.

I don't want you just to eat, and be content.

I want you to walk out into the fields

where the water is shining, and the rice has risen.

I want you to stand there, far from the white tablecloth.

I want you to fill your hands with the mud, like a blessing.

from When Death Comes

When it's over, I want to say: all my life

I was a bride married to amazement.

I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

When it's over, I don't want to wonder

if I have made of my life something particular, and real.

I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,

or full of argument.

I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.

from In Blackwater Woods

To live in this world

you must be able to

to do three things:

to love what is mortal;

to hold it

against your bones knowing

your own life depends on it;

and, when the time comes to let it go,

to let it go.

from Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.