A longer poem from Janet Loflin Lee
My bones no longer carry me well
My bones no longer carry me well,
my body a bag of fog, bogwater and bits of string.
It is a winter heaviness,
like all northern people I look for the returning light.
I am compelled to sleep in the day,
more than a nap, more than a cessation of movement –
a hardening of body, soul and thought.
I have always entered into winter with a hunger
for that china plate blue sky,
the gentled muffled sound of snow –
cotton falling on cotton.
But now I yearn for an early mardi gras of color
an infusion of warmth,
a sense of movement that precedes dancing,
a slower sun, an elongated day
An afternoon that is not evening too.
I park myself by the window
following the arc of the sun.
Work undone, projects abandoned,
I have become a hoarder of light,
storing up against the dark folds
of the January nights.
I love the progression of these drawings – each one a story unto itself, resonating with the stanzas but not limited by them. Beautiful work.
Thanks Janet,
I really loved working with this poem, there was already so much color in it!