Tags
Alex Carr-Malcolm poet, Alex Carr-Malcolm poetry, Alexandra Carr-Malcolm, napowrimo, NaPoWriMo 2016, Poem-a-thon Sheffield, poetry, where this is that becomes, Yorkshire poet
Today’s poem was part of the Sheffield Poem-a-thon that took place yesterday. 50 poets read in succession from 10am to 6pm. We were all sponsored and in total managed to raise £12,000 for Assist Sheffield, a charity who help destitute refugees and asylum in Sheffield. It was an uplifting and successful event with standing room only. A big thank you to all my sponsors who raised £162 – yay! Also a big thank you to my husband who kindly filmed me 🙂
Where this is, that becomes
When faced with the woven richness
of each slipping second,
I am confounded by its
mystery, absurdity, improbability,
each a miraculously stitched detail
in varying shades of the same thread.
When meditating
upon physiology of this being,
I can see how the headbone’s
connected to the backbone,
but asking how the heartbone’s
connected to the rainbow,
is a phenomenally fleeting fancy.
Where is the now of this very moment?
An ephemeral essence,
lingering upon the mind’s eye,
to be lost and witnessed,
more subtle than the breath of a bee,
more fragile than the heart of a butterfly
beating the odds – a winding down clock.
This is beyond a sense that is common,
and beyond the grasp of a humble hand;
it is the faint fragrance of a primal memory,
nurtured in the nursery,
played out by the quixotic,
protagonists in the playground of quotidian,
an egotistic boomerang.
So what is mine and mind?
where do I end and you begin?
To see the conundrum, the continuous koan
of life and death, of mind and breath;
do I want to be me or an Oak tree,
aren’t we the same? A branch of humanity,
seasoned with bittersweet reality.
© Where this is, that becomes 01.07.2013
by Alexandra Carr-Malcolm
Alexandra David-Néel
Worldly Winds 