Image of Charlotte Gainsbourg chosen by Tess Kincaid to lead on this week's The Mag
Where Are You Now?
You sang your way in
and left me hot images
on the redwood slab,
the table in front
of my knees now, knobs of bone
that grind sand between
moments of my claim
on you. As if you matter.
You were my dream but
you were not a real
girl - Pinocchio all in full
drag, wooden head girl.
My heart full of dust
and ache for what you could be
and me too, me too.
January 27, 2013 10:34 AM
I have written this poem to the image left for us on Mag 153. That image appears in my fantasy recall as an image of someone I might have known back in the sixties, me in my twenties. It seems to be an image of her as she might have been in some other story of her youth and mine. I am grateful I she did not appear, did not rise up within me until twilight colored things differently. I am grateful I knew this dream for a short time rather than the lifetime obsession that could have been. I think. Maybe not. This one's for you, dear.
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ah... i also saw this as a missing someone gone type of poem... interesting take on the theme.
ReplyDeletenot alone
We traveled in the same time.
ReplyDeleteMy take went from the album in her lap.
Sharp and innovative...
ReplyDeleteA touch of nostalgia for the might have been past? I enjoyed it, thanks.
ReplyDeletegreat writing!
ReplyDeleteI love this, Christopher .........
ReplyDeletenice one indeed....thanks for sharing
ReplyDeleteDream-like lovely write...one of your best, C...
ReplyDeletethe ache.........
ReplyDeletei wonder what is real between any two people, where myth and story begins and where it ends. in the moment it all seems very real, of course, but reflecting back is where i have the problems. someone from my past very recently said he chooses to remember me as he thought i was. that suggests he never knew me as i was. of course, this might come from pain, and i understand this but it sure casts a shadow of a question onto all relationships between people.
ReplyDeleteyou seem to be content to rest this reverie on the dream. it aches and is sweet this way. you both were, i am sure, very special in this time, very ripe and alive.
for the record, charlotte gainsbourg is hot, not that this is anyone's surprise:)
xo
erin
Erin, I have given up on the wish that you or anyone know who I really am. I have admitted I don't know who I really am, and never did. I think the Buddhists are right more or less when they say there is no "me". I say there may be a "real me" but he is not here. I can't know who you are either.
ReplyDeleteWhat is real between us is any commitment we might make. The commitment stands whatever our states may be, a compact that survives changes. At least I hope for that. It is what made my marriage survive for twenty years. It took big stuff to break the commitment. That doesn't make holding to the commitment smart or wise or favorable or whatever, it just is possible to hold still within it.