I am sitting atop the freezer in the laundry room. I have decided to move the table Luke and Isabel returned back in here, but a lot of stuff needs to get moved out of the corner first. I’ve already tried finding solitude elsewhere, but no spot is good enough. Someone invariably discovers my hiding place. Normally, I’d not be desperate for a quiet place to think, read, and/or write, but life has been full and my routine mostly empty since Wednesday. While I can manage such a situation, I need to dip back into the ordinary and get my bearings every now and again.
Ray Bradbury has reminded me, again, to read poetry every day, so I’ve pulled Collected Poems of Dylan Thomas off the shelf, but I’ll need to supplement such challenging verse with some that’s a bit more straightforward, so I’ve also got The Giant Book of Poetry close to hand. Yes, I’ll go back to the beginning. I always do. I’ll revisit the man who has abandoned his home and kingdom, surrendering it all to the unconsecrated foe. “Ishtar” is a poem from ancient Babylon, and its translated form, though straightforward, still manages to make me feel the fear to which the speaker succumbed, standing in his courts, bereft of robe, jewels, and dignity, but still blessed with flesh and bone.
Dylan Thomas gives me sounds and sensations and winding ways of making sense:
Huloo, my prowed dove with a flute!
Ahoy, old, sea-legged fox,
Tom tit and Dai mouse!
My ark sings in the sun
At God speeded summer’s end.
And the flood flowers now.