She labors to breathe,
and I coax her next heartbeat
hour upon long hour
as if this sinking
ship will shore if I can keep
all the rats above water.
My really profound thoughts for Real Toads in a vaguely sedoka-like form for dVerse
Friday, June 21, 2013
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About Me
- Maude Lynn
- Anybody who has survived his childhood has enough information about life to last him the rest of his days. ---Flannery O'Connor
31 comments:
Those thought sting.. all the rats above water ... would that really hold the ship.
Wonderful and poignant distillation, MZ. Agh. One rat down another pops up. Well done. k.
oh better a rat above where you can see than one below that will sneak up on you...coaxing a heartbeat, now that is rather intense...
oh better a rat above where you can see than one below that will sneak up on you...coaxing a heartbeat, now that is rather intense...
This hits a mother's heart close to home, MZ. Hope your baby girl is not ill. But what a write! No one writes deep truths as pithily and perfectly as you do.
What a fearful moment you have captured here - to be the observer of a sinking ship. I read this as if one were sitting at the bedside of a beloved parent or grand-parent. there is a sense of acknowledged hopelessness in the final image.
Oh, Mama Zen, this shivered me timbers! Awesome!
So much emotionality captured in this, the anxiousness, the fear, the despondency, the hopelessness mixed with hope.
I had a friend who came down with sedoka. They became agitated any time they saw a 5 or a 7. Seriously.
This really is very profound. Now I must go look up this form too! Thanks.
Hi Mama Zen, it's been a while since we visited with one another.
Poignant poetry. Beautifully succinct. For me, the image that came to mind first was nursing a doggie close to death.
staring up at the surface of the water, how I feel post reading. ~ M
At 2am, I can imagine the terror.
Such emotion, such concern...so very well captured.
Life lines, and mooring lines, too, come in many forms.
(Also, ROFLing at FB)
To me it's a matter of whether to save the rats at all, but at 2 am I might mistake something much more lovely for an awful rodent so I will join the narrator in coaxing the breath. I hope this dilemma is not attacking you now, it's so unfair to carry the entire world in your arms!
Mama Z, this piece screams "motherhood"; doing what needs to be done for a family's survival. Well done.
Uggh... heart-wrenching. This is all too real. Excellent writing on the form. -Mike
I have sat at that bedside. It is a painful place. A beautiful piece Mama Zen.
... it speaks of a deep love that fights along side a loved one when very sick. I hope this is not going on with you with a loved one, but if it is, I can think of NO greater comfort that a loved one beside me.
dang - this is awesome mz
Been there - never heard the rats...just gurgles..Oh MZ how you make me feel
Hard thinking, anti-sinking...
I hope this is pure fiction...
yikes, i sure feel this one.
To be able to distill such huge thoughts into this kind of graceful and curt thought process....damnation Mama Zen, you always get it right. Excuse me while I go to the hospital and get the bullet pulled from between my eyes.
Yep...this one is done just right. >>Stands, applauds, walks out of the theater and into oncoming traffic <<
This one tugged at my heart strings~
Powerful and well done
:D
This reminds me of being with both of my parents as they each died, two years apart.
I think your second stanza particularly poignant in this regard. My young sister-in-law was with me as Mother lay dying, and Mom asked us to leave the room while the nurses tidied up her bed. We went down the hall to look at the ocean, and suddenly the nurse was there, to get us back. Mom hadn't wanted us to see her die.
I was half asleep in a fold-down chair-bed thing, listening to my dad breathe, quit breathing, then start again, because his horn-player's lungs were so strong they restarted his heart.
But the time came when he stopped, and didn't start again. I waited, sure his lungs would continue to play a hot jazz trumpet, but the breathing came no more.
"as if this sinking
ship will shore if I can keep
all the rats above water."
You succinctly express what I took paragraphs to babble.
K
It indeed has the soul of sedoka:)
Oh my. This is powerful and real. You capture so much emotion in so few words. Beautifully wrought.
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