There’s little I can’t find here.
Birds flying about doing their thing.
The trees and their leaves that one craves.
The voices churning in the restless sea.
The missing pages of my childhood.
Everything, depending on how you define wealth,
including love and peace.
Days are the river bridging the years,
undefiled and inviolate.
I’ve pretty much learned to let go of a fraying story,
yet managed to survive all the beheadings.
I’m seated at my desk on the 19th floor
of a downtown building facing a blue sky west,
and turn to look out the window.
The Towers are standing.
As for me, a moment of light passing
through a honeycomb.
Wondering who? Where? Why?
Most of all, when I lay awake nights, I can almost
hear myself ask again and my mother answer,
one more story then, my darling restless boy,
to help you shut your eyes and go to sleep.
Lost in such a world, how can it be otherwise?
Each must have a safe place in the heart
as God approaches.
I hurry toward the beginning,
because each slow morning the sky grows light
at the threshold of dew and the dove sings new.
I think it’s singing, by my way of thinking.
After all, I’m the one who heard a whole
new world to myself.
The word unlocks the room I live inside.
And what the days afford.
Yes, it is singing.
Sleep, child. Sleep.
Stephen Cipot
Garden City Park
Note: I’m sometimes reminded of a statement by the late neurosurgeon and writer Dr. Oliver Sacks: “Life is based on hypothesis and conjecture.”
The older I get I have come to see the wisdom in this.
Being retired, among a number of challenging new activities more significant is attempting to serve as a volunteer EMT, so far completing much of the coursework and training toward certification.
In my limited capacity, I have helped tend to the suicide-prone, OD sufferers, those experiencing medical, trauma and other emergencies. Now even more so I believe reality can change very quickly, life is limited and more than precious.
What is reality? When young my family moved around a lot and I briefly attended school in a segregated community and city, and let me say, I began understanding that throughout our diverse country reality is perceived differently than I thought I was used to. I also learned hate is essentially nurtured within fear.
Among Dr. Sacks’ provocative and interesting writings, his non-fiction book “Awakenings” (1973) recounts the life histories of those who were victims of the 1920s encephalitis lethargica epidemic, made into a 1990 movie featuring Robert DeNero and Robin Williams.
Sacks’ collections of essays which are based on his patients also stand out. One collection in particular is titled after a man who suddenly mistook his wife for a hat. It is good place to begin a story. To end, thank you for taking the time to read my epistolary and creative ministrations. Wishing all the very best holidays.
