all poems and photographs
© by Maya Stein

all poems and photographs
© by Maya Stein
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Friday, May 23, 2008

how to let go

























Maybe you just do it, unclench from the lip of the great, wide
unknown, whatever you envision as the cataclysmic drop into total
failure, or disappointment, or disaster, some precipitous nothingness
where you refuse, in your hardest heart, to locate yourself. But
what’s better than nothingness, that blank and soundless freefall?
How is it possible to enter, gracefully, a room
already crowded with furniture?

Here are your feet, your hands, your skin.
Here is the sound of your breathing lungs.
Here is the way you manage to make a meal
out of the castoffs in your cupboard.
Here is east and west. Here is 6 o’clock in the morning.
Here is midnight. Here is a piece of notebook paper.
Here is your history.
Here is your wisdom.
Falling will not change any of that.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

"But what's better than nothingness, that blank and soundless freefall?"

Indeed. It is peace at last...

This is beautiful, Maya. Thank you.

Anonymous said...

How is it possible to enter, gracefully, a room
already crowded with furniture?

Great line. What a question!

-g

GailNHB said...

And I like that last part: all of the reminders of the things that ground us, that make us who we are, that remind us of the goodness and the simplicity of life. Falling will not change any of that. Neither will getting up, dusting myself off, and continuing on my adventure.

Anonymous said...

Falling will not change any of that. Neither will failing.