Balance in April

Joining Juliann and friends on this last Tuesday of the month to talk about my one little word. As I explore the ups and downs of balance, I've learned something new this month. For me, living a balanced life includes poetry. I've read poetry before, but somehow I've really begun to take it to heart. In the hands of a skilled poet, simple words can help me to explore, express, and clarify what I'm feeling. A good poem can become a sort of mantra that I carry with me, can help me get through the bad times, and celebrate the good times.

I think much of this new appreciation of poetry is due to the poems and poets Kym shared during April. One of my new favorites is Balance by Jane Hirshfield and I was so taken with Good Bones by Maggie Smith that I bought the book and have been reading it, carefully savoring. Here's one I want to share:

Stonefish

There are fish in the black trenches
of the sea that look like rocks.
Their poison shouldn't trouble me.
They are so deep, we'll never touch.
But I think of them. If it is paranoid
to believe there is a trench in me
the doctors haven't dragged,
a cave no one's plumbed with light,
then fine, I'm paranoid. But whatever
plaques and tangles, whatever cells
wait deadly with their terrible hunger
must be disguised. You should know
the most venomous fish lives
in the shallows. It also looks like a rock.

Good Bones, published by Tupelo Press in 2017. Copyright Maggie Smith.

Thank you, Kym, for helping me see how much poetry can help in balancing my life, and exposing me to poems and poets who do it so well!