Questions In The Mind Of A Poet While She Washes Her Floors
Will obedience leave me unknown to myself, stranded? Is it enough for me to know where I'm from? If I do more truth-telling will I be happier with what I say? If I had three days to live would I still be sensible? Is the break between my feelings and my memory the reason I'm unable to sustain rage? Am I a peninsula slowly turning into an island? If I grew up gazing at the ocean would I think life came in waves? If I were a nomad would I measure time by the length of a footstep? If I can see a cup drop to the floor and shatter why can't I see it gather itself back together? If a surgeon cut out my mistakes would the scar be under my heart? How much time will I spend protecting myself from what the people I love call love? Would my desires feel different if I lived forever? Will my desires destroy my politics? Is taboo sex the ultimate aphrodisiac? If I fall in love with the wrong person How do I learn to un-in love myself? Can I make my intuition into a divining rod? Is music the closest I can get to God? How many of these questions will remain when I kneel to wash my floors again?
Credit
From Mercy Mercy Me by Elena Georgiou. Copyright © 2000. Reprinted by permission of the University of Wisconsin Press. All rights reserved.
Date Published
01/01/2000