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ALISON CHISHOLM
Pieta
See where marble fell away
revealing at its heart
the world's core: for here
this body broken for us all
is muscled in stone, veined
where rock itself pulses, wrapped
in petrified folds.
Look further: see beyond pale flesh
and focus where a mother's downcast gaze
pierces the soul's centre. Let her grief
start tears behind your eyes
as if your son -- scourged, tortured, crucified -
freezes in your arms.
This moment encapsulates eternity,
fixes the cost of reconciliation;
and it is here, where sightless eyes angle
through neverending pain, you learn
the strength of woman.
Her hands that fed and dressed a child
support his wounded side, gesture
a need to understand. Her lap,
where an infant smiled, cradled safe,
holds his dead weight. Her lips
that kissed away his tears are set,
closed firm against a hint
of pity or complaint.
She is unyielding; her power is absolute
and incorruptible. Look again
where woman's essence stirs the very air,
to see where marble weeps and bleeds.
Fait Accompli
Become a poet? If there were a choice
Would I have picked the hardest road of all?
Perhaps I learned a cadence in the voice,
Or read till Wordsworth held me in his thrall.
Become a poet? How could I resist
Iambic metres echoed in my heart
And pulsing flow of blood? Could I exist
Without insistent rhythms of my art
In waking, sleeping, motion of my days
Repeating verse on verse? My very cells
Are syllables; and images amaze
In neutral routes from memory's deep wells.
BECOME a poet? No, for poetry
has always been the life force born in me.
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