Poetry Friday
The Butterfly Effect
For Marie Ennis O’Connor
So close and still
Quietly far away
From the company
Who chose you
The day you heard
The word we all
Heard.
Echoes
In a canyon
Far from home
Yet near
Your heart
Beats. Chambers sound
Off and reverberate.
Received
Re-spoken
And released
Like butterflies.
They whisper
By, like their
Lives – yet louder
For the hand
Supporting our
Unraveling from the
Chrysalises we
Tickle your palm until
Your fingers open
1,2,3,4,5 like that!
And we are released
Covering the sky with color
Orange yellow black blue purple green
And you smile as we scatter.
Though our words may never mind
You or the hands you once held them
Inside – we remember you when our
Names show up
Spoke in unexpected
Places around
The world
I think it’s called
The butterfly
Effect.
Subtle are the changes
Yet so very
Important.
Ilene Kaminsky
Marie I’m honored and I am blessed, for having the amazing friendship from around the globe – the support you give I did truly priceless. For a writer, no matter how humble, loves to feel they are not screaming into an abyss but that their words are heard and better yet, get a response. This of the very.best start to a sleepless night’s day I could possibly imagine. Thank you -I cannot even say how much this made me smile today. *sigh*
BTW – I wrote this in a burst of words that came to me in a flash, and I felt needed little editing. There’s a few nods to e.e,cummings- Buffalo Bill and a couple of others. A nod to our departed Mary Oliver and you and my cancer posse gave me the impetus to write it. Usually I do about 50 rewrites if not more as the craft Is in editing as well as the initial poem ideation,
I’m glad it’s made you feel what I meant which was absolute gratitude
.
With much love,
Ilene
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Ilene, your words, as I’ve said many times are a gift to me. Your writing is a gift to our community – and this poem is one of the most precious gifts I’ve ever received. I wish I had words to express my heartfelt gratitude to you – but I’m a collector of words and stories more than I am an articulate writer. I would like to share some words with you from an old Irish saying. In Gaelic “ar scáth a chéile a mhaireas na daoine” – It is in the shelter of each other that the people live. We are blessed indeed to have found some shelter in each other’s words and care in the storm of cancer xxx
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Well, Marie I dare to say that you’re as eloquent as any one of us on a good day. To shepherd words spoken by those who may not be here to thank you isn’t an easy task or for the faint of heart. One day the person behind each of these blogs will have a last post pinned up either by the writer or per our instruction someone we trust, or just no more words ever again – only left behind will be the words we once said as we defied the odds.
I’m not sure which is more difficult. I can offer this – I know my sadness and fear come not from the prospect of my own demise but of what my leaving this life will do to those who are left to mourn. My blog began as a gift to Craig. He cannot even fathom life again without me. There was our life before we met on our first date and we are still on that date in so many ways. We have spent only a handful of nights apart since we met. Kismet! Now with the depression that fell over him which my cancer diagnosis kicked just the right dominos over to push him down to the abyss, I wanted to leave him my words for when he was stronger and perhaps without me do he could hear my voice whenever he wants.
There was an unexpected upside of the blog, too. That I gathered love and support around my body and mind from people who were strangers until our words collided and returning to them my support either with intention or through the luck of the search.
You’re a masterful curator who’s heart is as big as all that and more. I love the heart you share and take what’s your professional skills and apply them to lifting our voices to a virtual megaphone and amplifying us to corners of this uncharted planet.
With all my love,
Ilene
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PS no glasses and tired eyes sorry for my typos.
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Ilene, once again I am lost for words – no adequate words will come to me – all I can say again is thank you, thank you, thank you xxxx
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Beautiful.
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