This poem poured out of me, took me by surprise.
I realized afterwards I have written some prose about my near death experience, but poetry.... I hadn't been ready. It reminded me of how long it took me to write about autism in my family. It felt like it would be too painful and the emotions might sweet me away.
It took a search on Flickr for the word "Fall" to bring forth this poem that had clearly been waiting for me to write this:
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September 30, 2011: a Giant Sequoia fell and no one knew why. She is standing in the upper left part of this frame.
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Estimated age? Close to 1800 - 2000 years.
Poem #3: Fall: Words Pour Out
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Sixteen months after
the shutter clicked
this Giant fell.
I haven’t visited
in eight years
or ninety six and
then some months
and I wonder if she
is still there, decomposing
across the hundred
giant trail?
Five months ago I
wasn’t breathing well
and I had a fever and I
went to the hospital and
had a nurse named Paloma
who waved to me so sadly
as they wheeled me into
ICU and I didn’t understand
why. At first I just got so cold
before the nurse came to
cover me as I shivered
without control it felt like the
ocean was folding over
my body and water was
filling everything but I
could not think or speak or
register blood oxygen
so the people in masks
and scrubs filled my
pretty hospital room and now
when I think of people
dying so quickly I think
I came so close
and I didn’t and
I’m so sorry they did
I want to walk the
trail again, touch her
tree skin, pay my
respects tell her
I remember “Julie - wake up” “Her heart rate goes low
while she sleeps-
watch out for that”
They whisper as if
I’m nothing more than
a pronoun
These memories fall
and I can’t do anything
to stop them. .
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