The Paddock Review

Departure 

 

My friends are departing 

Yesterday, today, tomorrow 

And I will follow 

Followed before 

Took breath, took shelter away from them 

I hide 

 

Wake up late; smell 

Rain on the air and the promise of coffee, 

Affection is downstairs 

Look up the spiral staircase, pause;

Clamber noisily up, over metal 

Go away again 

 

The fleetingness of it all lends 

Intensity and madness, makes it 

All worth

Something 

Glittering sun, we spin and snap shutters open and shut as she 

Speeds up in the setting, setting, always 

Too fast 

As the colors burst in the sky and the blue gives way to burning, 

Burning 

Stumble up the steps to the writer’s studio, squeeze my eyes 

Tight shut against the light 

 

Mind racing / retreat into myself  

Breath steady / slowing 

Crawling on four knees,

Careful, around 

Barbed wire and imposed borders, the rigidity 

And wildness of my interior 

Reveals herself

 

Wake up late; smell 

Rain on the air the promise of coffee downstairs 

And cry 

We are departing, we are departing 

We are the leaving and the coming 

The leaves lie yellow on the ground the rain 

Sighs, waiting 

To fall

 

Wake late, sleep long, 

Wake feeling an island of myself 

Close and on the brink of something 

Reach out, up over the cliff face I struggle to haul myself over 

Doubt myself 

Crane my neck I can’t see it but I reach 

Anyway 

We reach 

Anyway 

Wake up late with faith 

My fingertips sense the 

Crevasse, small handhold

Legs shaking, eyes wet 

All I need 

Haul us 

Over the ledge 

 

Before returning 

Down spiral stairs to the kitchen 

Where hot coffee always waits 

 

We remain together, 

Black horses wet with rain 

The skies part, 

Depart, galloping over grey clouds

heavy;

 

Return to the sky to 

Leave again, be 

Collected 

In books, we remain 

 

Water heated, forced through 

Tiny holes in metal to make 

Hot 

Coffee in the kitchens we 

Create.

 

 

….

This poem is from the book Home is Where by Isabel Rose Soloaga (Finishing Line Press), and can be found at https://finishinglinepress.com/product/home-is-where-by-isabel-rose-soloaga/