after Clemente
So try to see with him that the body is a comma
in the text of the infinite, shelter
between the external world and the inner;
and the skin is the region in common
between the space of a room and the space inside
the body; there is this landscape of the world
and inner matter, the inner in flux as much
as the outer, face of the earth changing as much
as the imagination; so looking this way
there’s no mirror, only a blending or wanting
to blend, and try to understand with him that the life
of the imagination is just as real as the rational,
the rational is a form of the imagination, rational
things are not any more necessary than imaginary
things, they are just more substantial, all are real
to the same degree; for instance art and the atomic
bomb have the same degree of reality in them;
everything is as vital as the other, no part of the self
in charge, no need for integration when the fragmentary
brings freedom, survival. And looking this way
is quite becalming, so when your pen pulls memories
into words from your imagination, you are
as powerful as a lama or a shaman, or the hawk
grabbing the rabbit up in his talons from the Pacific
Brussels sprout fields, and the cry of the rabbit is the first
cry of the newborn, or the just-coming-into,
follow me reader, these places in your imagination
frighten you, but are no less frightening
than the reality of those who lost everything
during the Depression or the Holocaust or the fire
that gutted out the transients’ hotel on Lombard Street
this April. Now looking this way is peaceful,
is it not, is nothing more lovely or terrifying…
see the gorgeous white lily is no more gorgeous
than the daisy or the weedy jimson, or the dandelion
and the words that spring from your pen
stir up memory are equal to the memory itself,
equal to the beauty of the day outside
which you are a part of, and yet the inside
is just as rich with smell and taste,
the newspaper’s headline no more important
than the scribbling of a poem
that comes to nothing, the first draft and the final
draft are as significant as the flower
in bud and the flower full-bloomed, the nectar
waiting there and the honey thereafter.
~ Leonore Wilson
Leonore Wilson serves on the MFA panel at St. Mary’s College in Moraga. She has taught English and Creative Writing at various colleges and universities in the Bay Area. Her work has been in such magazines as Third Coast, DMQ Review, Pif, Madison Review, and Silk Road. Her new book is Western Solstice by Hiraeth Press.
Artwork: ‘Scared that he’ll get caught, without a second thought’, by Amra Khan
