And so my brothers and sisters,
Whatever is true; whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable, If anything is excellent think about such things. Philippians Chapter 8 verse 4
Amy Cornell is a local freelance writer in Bloomington, Indiana. Pre-covid, Amy co-led writing circles with incarcerated women at the Monroe County Corrections Center, and creative writing and memoir circles for Women Writing for (a) Change of Bloomington. Amy writes poetry, creative non-fiction, novels, blog posts, book reviews, short stories, and loves to hear other women tell stories both real and imagined. Every April she participates in the National Poetry Writing Month Challenge of writing a poem a day for 30 days. These are some of those poems.
Welcome to the Poets Weave, I'm Romayne Rubinas Dorsey. Amy, what poems have you brought for us today?
The Birth of Love
I’m pretty sure love was born
that day in 1888 when the first
ball point pen rolled off the line
and made its way to me-
so I could write your phone
number on my sweaty palm.
Or perhaps it was born when
when wood pulp was first
squeezed into paper that stormy
day in Han China 102 CE so it
could become the valentine
on which I wrote my first note
to you.
But really I know that
love was created in the 1880s
when Dr. Fleet first rolled
wax into a cylinder and sold
it as chapstick so that I could carry
the bubblegum flavor in my
pocket and have it on hand
when I first closed my
eyes to kiss you.
The origins of origin
I am the big bang-stretching out over billions of years
curling into myself for a few billion more.
I have slowed awhile, letting my particles get big
and let them settle into things of being
Like waterfalls and toasters and brown bears.
Humans don’t understand me. They picture
me like a surprise party. I am confetti.
I am soda pop that gets shaken and explodes
over the dining room. I am pure light and energy.
I went along like this for a few more millennia
expanding and contracting and showing off my confetti
until I met you. And there we were—
Two lonely bangs-Expanding and contracting together.
Looking for love. I’d say it was a match made in heaven
the purest beginning to any story. Just
two big universes off to the movies, holding
hands and riding bikes. Lazy summer days.
Picnics. Looking back, I see that beginnings
are the easy part. Its sustaining this love
beyond matter, and particle, and wave
over time and time and time. That,
was always the key to loving you.
Dandelion
It was so hard at first.
watching Adam pick out
flower after flower to present
to Eve as twilight descended.
This rose is my love, he’d say.
Take thee Lily of the valley, for happiness
and the tulips, tulips, tulips
all that love and remembrance.
Little me at their feet.
Season after season,
eyes upturned: look at me!
Look at me! Surely my
yellow face can give you some
pause, render some passion
or happiness or bliss.
But then each season would end
and my face dissolved in a burst
of wind and I floated about
visiting sisters and cousins
in gardens far and wide. Favorite
of children in every age.
And it wasn’t just Adam. No.
It was Helen and her anemones.
Ghengis Khan and his larkspur.
Thomas fucking Jefferson and his lilacs.
All those damn lilacs which go on and on and on
And smell better than I ever could.
All the flowers; all the love and
remembrance and purity and
what am I left with? Me old
Dandelion old soul, me
just your oracle. Old time
wandering teller of futures,
how you’ll be regarded
by this new generation of war
veterans with their poppies or
these hippies with their daisies.
Cursed to be forgotten.
Blessed to be forever.
I am dandelion.
You've been listening to the poetry of Amy Cornell on the Poets Weave. I'm Romayne Rubinas Dorsey.