Late Air
Elizabeth Bishop
From a magician’s midnight sleeve
the radio-singers
distribute all their love-songs
over the dew-wet lawns.
And like a fortune-teller’s
their marrow-piercing guesses are whatever you believe.
But on the Navy Yard aerial I find
better witness
for love on summer nights.
Five remote red lights
keep their nests there; Phoenixes
burning quietly, where the dew cannot climb.
Memory Drifts
December Second, Nineteen Ninety-Nine.
Fox 5 broke the news in muted business
Tones, much to the enjoyment of my kids.
Winter’s sky is folded with clouds and snow,
Leaving the windows cold-veined and stained glass
Around the edges. They exalt, wearing
Pajamas inside out, shouting worship
To weathermen and fate alike.
I help the boys shove their hands into gloves,
Lace up the girls boots, and remember Mom.
Her housecoat, the curve of rollers and wrist.
She loved the season, the feel of cheekbone
Blush and frosty fingers. She lies, now buried
Beneath drifts fallen from memories.
They play, tumble and laugh with heads thrown back,
Exposing red scarved throats to the white elfin
Underbelly of Winter’s wily gods.
I watch them through the inhale of coffee
and cream, feel the slick of Mom and hare-footed
years. All throughout the day, I remember.
Everyone sits in a line on the couch, watching Fox 5, waiting to hear the news. I start fussing about in the kitchen, slippers and robe swishing against wooden cabinets. The coffee pot bubbles as I pull out bowls and spoons, Cheerios and microwaveable oatmeal. Sandy is sprawled out in front of the space heater, oblivious to the snow-packed tension hanging in the air. I carefully step over her twitching paws, making sure to avoid stepping on her tail, and tell the kids to calm down. Stop bouncing on the couch. School may be canceled, but then again, it may not.
“This Is Virginia, after-all.”
Sarah has no idea what’s going on and slides to the floor, amusing herself by trying to fit her boot-clad foot inside her mitten. Thomas waves his flannelled arms in front of Katie’s face, asking if she can help him cross his fingers, for luck. Christopher threw his head back against the couch cushion when the News went to commercial, five minutes ago. I don’t know if he cares about school or not, because it’s all relative, anyways.
I remember days like this, back in Maine. The mornings Mom would come wake me up, pulling me gently from sleep and wrapping me in a warm blanket as she walked me to the window. “Look,” she’d say, as she swept back the curtain. “Look at the snow.”
The land would be a softly muted white, the stillness hanging in the trees. I knew the pond would be frozen solid, and I’d stand up on my tiptoes to see if the neighborhood kids had already started sledding down Mr. Mollin’s hill. Mom’s palms and wrist would gently curve around my waist and she’d lean her head down so she could see the world from my eyes. I’d laugh and squirm, from excitement and the itchiness her curlers would brush along my cheeks. This season was ours, always hers and mine.
The dictionary defines form as an external appearance, a bodily shape, a way to arrange components to achieve an overall pleasing effect. Political and social movements influence the form of poetry, giving it a physical representation. The ideas turn into an individualistic view and/or definition of the time period. In other words, a physical form, such as Frost or Fleur-de-Lis, change into a physical poem. The physical poem takes the curves of the leaves, the vein-like structure of Frost, and alters the shape, turning it into something a writer or reader can hear and connect with emotionally.
Form shapes a poem, both literally (sonnets, couplets) and also in meaning. Ideas are molded to fit the poet’s concept of politics, nature, emotions, and the world around him. Words and their definitions are teased and adjusted so they connect harmoniously.
I see the living breath of form seared behind my eyelids, pressing against the barriers of flesh and soul, and feel it, earthen and worm-encrusted beneath the pads of my feet. It’s in the lazy breaking of upwards smoke or the play of aged wood grain, and floats in the soft swill of plane cloud trails, resting quietly in the flourishing curves of flesh and script.
Form in dance, rhythmic, free-spirited, defined in staccato beats and balanced fortes. In sports; the clash of plastic and bone, the position of players on a pitch. Inside a room, a bedroom, with end tables and a bed, knick-knacks balancing precariously on a dusty ledge. Daddy’s den, the body-dented Lazyboys and the years of ESPN drabble littered along the flaking trim. The burst of rain in the city, the swell of farm and field and the sway of cattle fences. A tongue, raised. Lips, parted. Words right there.
School defines form in the scribble of markers, permanently erased but still lingering on the wash of white walls. It’s in the shape of desks, the pattern of students that fill a room. The words of lecture that knit into meaning in mid-air. My opinion. Your interpretation. The meaning of It, of it all.
