Skip to main content

Once Upon a Semester


I am in the glass store; the small storefront
near the yoga studio and the eye doctor and...
well, the gift store closed last month.

I walked past the blank darkness earlier.

It reminded me of sleeping and waking,
a city beneath me, then swirling down into it,
my eyes young enough to see every glint.

Sleeping and waking into the university city;
now my hair is wilder, wispier, and the dark glass
shows a parking lot, a road, dust patterns.

This familiar emptiness fills glass, this broad sky
in which I've been sleeping and waking allows
for breathing, when I'm already city-filled.

Sharing with The Sunday Muse #168. 

-- Chrissa

Comments

  1. qbitJuly 11, 2021 at 7:24 AM

    Oh wow. I loved this, so good. And the last lines -- the emptiness giving you room to breathe. Unexpected and both tragic and wonderful. The holes in the world dark yet permitting light.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Carrie Van HornJuly 11, 2021 at 8:33 AM

    I second what Qbit said. The broad span of time perspective shown is brilliant! An amazing poem my friend!!

    ReplyDelete
  3. HelenJuly 11, 2021 at 9:41 AM

    Familiar emptiness .... brilliant.

    ReplyDelete
  4. FireblossomJuly 11, 2021 at 10:06 AM

    Really fine poetry, Chrissa. One of my favorites of yours for sure.

    I couldn't help but flash on this song:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJb__Uczlos

    ReplyDelete
  5. indybevJuly 11, 2021 at 10:34 AM

    :City-filled". Described me so often in my working life; happy now to live on the fringes!

    ReplyDelete
  6. SunitaJuly 11, 2021 at 11:31 AM

    That's brilliant! The way you captured the feel of the city life ...awesome poem, Chrissa!

    ReplyDelete
  7. ms_liliJuly 11, 2021 at 11:31 AM

    The city becomes a part of who you are when you live there. Good description of it, Chrissa.

    ReplyDelete
  8. JimJuly 11, 2021 at 6:03 PM

    I hate to see all of the closed businesses and hear of the evictions of those not able to have a home because of low savings. We shopped at the 99 Cent Store after church for a few minutes and coming out I notice that one of the shops nearby had closed. Every now and then we ate at Luby's or Fudrucker's but ours close by is closed. There are others which were bought out and have stayed open.
    ..

    ReplyDelete
  9. Phoenix RetributionJuly 12, 2021 at 1:16 PM

    Reminiscent of the now that we live in, beautifully written.

    ReplyDelete
  10. JinksyJuly 13, 2021 at 8:26 AM

    ' City filled' - what a great way to explain a townies life. :-)

    ReplyDelete
  11. Susie ClevengerJuly 14, 2021 at 2:19 PM

    Love this glass eye into the city

    ReplyDelete
  12. purplepeninportland.comJuly 14, 2021 at 5:57 PM

    "already city-filled"

    Great line, Chrissa. I love the use of glass in this.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Turn Away

  Sharing with The Sunday Muse , for #193. Turn away, like the moon, listening... Listening to the planet that rumbles with a hundred million slaps. All the feet, all the rockets, all the  pistons in the cars on the asphalt over the chasm where the veins run deep, blue in sunlight, black at night. Running over the chasm.  Once or twice they ran to you. Once or twice they ran by. Greetings and salutations. The sky is an entertaining shade of concrete yellow as the rain promised earlier in the week makes good on its arrival. It's a disturbing bright sallow sky, the kind of sky that puts you in mind of old movies and degraded film stock and the pops and crackles incidental to the main story.  Several years ago I made a resolution to journal more and last year I came across a video that suggested I actually re-read those journals, at least those of the previous year, at the beginning of each new year. Technically, I have kept the journal resolution, making daily notes in...
15 comments
Read more

By the Roadside

  Sharing with The Sunday Muse #260  with much appreciation to Carrie & Shay & everyone. Just a reminder: if you have a poetry book, please drop a title in the comments. My TBR won't thank you, but I will. :)    I drive by the armadillos, dead where they fell. Sunlight is so heavy it folds into damp shimmers. All the roads are widening, dispersing the ditches, Grinding out parking lots, killing slow steps. I speed up; crisp winter in the passenger seat. We will arrive at the store soon; I will drag her Chill, into the store. Breathe for both of us. Brightness distorts the lots, now grown gigantic. Roads need blood, the state needs the kills. We will make it through barriers if we wear them: Dead armadillos, caliche dust, gunmetal sunshine.
8 comments
Read more

To Blue Fields Far Below

 Sharing with The Sunday Muse #228 , The Fashionable Twenties.  A sycamore fairy sits crosslegged in the road Dragons swim toward smooth hills above the storms Vines embrace the telephone poles  Someone washed the blue skies and she knows  It's time to dare the salty foam It's time to wade through the eternal fields' folds And gather golden apples for home.  Hoping this finds you with space to daydream and a good book in which to wander. Working on turning last week's prompt into a longer piece, as I found myself intrigued by the idea of tea in the garden as combat. Social situations are not my forte. As it's still Spider September, there will be a chihuahua-sized jumping spider that is none too happy about anything but hunting squirrels (that's for you, Mom).  -- Chrissa
6 comments
Read more