Reluctant Diver – Susan Richardson

 

I move toward the pool with delusions

of grace coursing through my muscles,

eager to feel the sky against my skin.

I am caught on the wings of a dream,

limbs in perfect formation,

like a bird in tandem with the wind

plunging toward the water.

I stop to linger in the scent of flight.

The smell of chlorine attacks my senses,

tearing doubt into my imagination.

I stumble to the ladder and start

my climb to the 3- meter board,

a thimble of fright tapping

a ballad across my rib bones.

Cold metal screams against my feet,

vines of anxiety crawling with skill

up the back of my neck.

I look nervously toward my coach,

pleading for a glimmer of confidence

or a fistful of staunch advice.

“If your fear is greater than your desire,

climb down”, she tells me.

It turns out I’m not a bird after all.

I prefer my feet on the ground.

 

 

 

Susan Richardson is living, writing and going blind in Los Angeles.  In addition to poetry, she writes a blog called, Stories from the Edge of Blindness. Her work has been published in Foxglove Journal, Amaryllis, The Writing Disorder and Eunoia Review, among others.  She was awarded the Sheila – Na – Gig 2017 Winter Poetry Prize, featured in the Literary Juice Q&A Series, and chosen as the Ink Sweat & Tears March 2018 Poet of the Month.  She also writes for the Arts and Lit Collective, Morality Park.

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August 6, 2018August 6, 2018 by foxglovejournal Categories: PoetryTags: anxiety, bird, CA, creative, creativity, diving, doubt, dream, flight, fright, ground, imagination, poem, Poetry, pool, senses, sky, Susan Richardson, US, water, wind, wings, writing 3 Comments

Fear of flying and other forays into the unknown – Claire Sexton

 

Don’t start with doubt and dissension. Don’t walk that tortuous plank right now.

Raise your head skyward and contemplate the birds – flying without a hint of reservation or restraint.

Self-consciousness has no meaning for them.

No avian ever fell from the sky because of overthinking; plunged earthward with their head in their wings – shouting ‘where did it all go wrong?’

But here I am undercutting my resolve with insidious doubts and oscillations – a suitcase of distraction and a rucksack of denials. A poker iron to stoke the flames.

I light my candles and repeat my affirmations. Yes, today I would like to travel first class. Today I would like to watch a movie and lay my head back in my chair.

I’d like muffins and fresh rolls please. Carbohydrates, and polite conversation. A perfect aptitude for give and take. Delays that do not make me sweat and toil.

Most of all I would like to taste the tranquility of knowing I have made progress. I have left the house. I have washed my face. I have all my documents, and time to spare.

Firefighters and first aiders will no longer be required.

 

 

Claire Sexton is a forty-something librarian living and working in London. She also writes poetry and occasionally creative non-fiction. She has been published in Ink, Sweat and Tears, Foxglove Journal, Amaryllis, Stare’s Nest, Peeking Cat Poetry and other magazines. She has just adopted a magnificent tortie cat called Queenie.

June 14, 2018June 14, 2018 by foxglovejournal Categories: PoetryTags: affirmations, birds, candles, Claire Sexton, conversation, creative, creativity, doubt, fear, flight, flying, knowledge, poem, Poetry, progress, sky, time, tranquility, travel, UK, unknown, wings, writing 1 Comment

Pumpkin Breath – John Michael Flynn

 

Across my palms, skin has swelled in lumps

crackled like these pumpkins around us.

I try to lift one and imagine the face I’ll carve.

A pebbled orange orb, it drops rotten from its hooked stem.

Its smell is foul, its seeded shards like wet pottery.

Not that one, but there are others to bring home.

 

We walk further down the row. Around us, blue hills rise.

I fall out of rank from the explosive legion

of voices that tends to invade quietude in such settings.

I squeeze my wife’s hand, hear again a word I cannot define.

It’s like an aunt dead and buried,

the one I’ve got a picture of but have never met.

 

What is it about such a word and its elusive associations?

I pause a moment. Neither of us speak.

We watch a small wind lift dust and fumes of fertilized soil.

I turn to her. She smiles shading her eyes from autumnal light.

Ambiguities remain. Doubts will come and go.

Ephemeral simplicities renew us.

 

In 2015, John Michael Flynn was an English Language Fellow with the US State Department at the Far Eastern State University in Khabarovsk, Russia. He is now back home in Virginia, where he teaches English part-time at Piedmont Virginia Community College. His most recent poetry collection, Keepers Meet Questing Eyes, is available from Leaf Garden Press. You can learn more about John and his published work at www.basilrosa.com.

March 4, 2017 by foxglovejournal Categories: Poetry, UncategorizedTags: autumn, creative, doubt, dust, earth, eyes, face, hand, hills, humanity, John Michael Flynn, life, light, poem, Poetry, pumpkins, renewal, skin, soil, US, VA, wind, writing Leave a comment