It was only a dream...

The house was quiet this evening. A was in the basement with friends, working on a school project. I was restless.

I found myself turning on every light in the living room, hoping to ward off the threatening dusk. Spring can't come soon enough to take away the chill that still lingers in the corners and creeps under the doors, it seems. My obsessive search for green things poking up in the flower beds remains fruitless, but today's warm afternoon was enough to sprout a semblance of hope.

Still I paced, like a beast too long caged.

After straightening the coasters on the end table, adjusting the lamp shades, and wiping the thin layer of dust from the television screen, I stood staring at the bookshelves for far longer than could be considered rational. Concentration has been difficult lately, and I needed something both simple, but absorbing to hold my attention.

As so often is the case, I found myself standing before the shelf of poetry. Over the years, so many of those books have become old friends. Dog-eared and well loved, a few contain secrets that will never be told. Others followed passing fashions and simply look more impressive than I honestly believe them to be. Each, though, has its place.

I buy poetry when I crave connection. Vivid pictures crafted from perfect metaphors are sometimes the only ways I can find to bridge the gaps between myself and...just about anything, really. People, events, situations - when I struggle to find where I belong in the mix, poetry lends the perspective for which I long.

Tonight, as I stood pondering the row of titles, I debated which would best settle the day's commotion. I flipped through Nikki Giovanni, Margaret Atwood, and Kahlil Gibran. Nothing was jumping out at me. Poe, Williams, Piercy, Benton.

Bah.

But then, tucked between Sandra Cisneros and Mary Oliver, was a thin brown paperback with white letters on the binding too small to read without my glasses. Puzzled, I pulled it out.

I swear to God, I have never seen this book before in my life. I have no idea where it came from, or when it found its way onto my shelf. Exchanging Lives, poems and translations, by Susan Bassnett and Alejandra Pizarnik - the back cover said it cost £7.99, and it looked s if it had never even been opened.

Was it a gift? Did I grab it randomly at a corner bookstore with the forgotten intent to peruse it later?

Where?

When?

I opened to a random page, and read the first passage I saw.

Salta con la camisa en llamas
de estralla a estralla
de sombra en sombre.
Muere de muerte lejana
la que ama al viento.

_______

Leaping with her shirt in flames
from star to star
from shadow to shadow.
Dying a distant death
the woman in love with the wind.

Surely I'd not have set this idly on a shelf without a second thought.

I bent the corner and flipped to a new page.

"Shapes"

I don't know if I'm bird or cage
or murderous hand
a young woman dead amid candles
an amazon panting in the great dark gorge
a silent woman
but who sometimes flows with language
sometimes entertains
or a princess in the highest tower

Another bent corner.

And another.

And another.

It seems that out of mystery, I've made an unexpected new friend.

And spring is coming.

dawn strikes in the flowers
leaving me drunk with nothingness and lilac light
drunk with stillness and with certainty

Maybe tomorrow I'll check the garden again...