Stone
I wonder what lies inside
this scarred shell, imagine;
clotted carrion, fractured fossils,
brittle blood, lubricious white of bone,
amber yolk. Alembic outcomes
of an unknown alchemy.
You echo with eons of transmutations.
Once it was believed that you carry maps
of whole constellations pressed into you.
I run my finger across your pitted surface,
feel each star-sparked indentation.
A face rises from your mottled skin,
bloody, scarred and broken, one eye
swollen shut, crack of mouth,
cross-scarred cheek, one granite tear
beneath an open eye. It’s that eye
that haunts me with it’s hopeless gaze.
We share a molecular sameness, a spirit
that lies deep within your torpid cells.
Eons of wisdom crammed
into one small stone. Your unyielding
endurance a dormant promise, blessings
buried in prophetic stillness.
~ Diane Buchanan
Diane Buchanan is a poet and an essayist from Edmonton. Â She has written three collections of poetry. Her second book, Between the Silences was short-listed for the Acorn-Plantos award for peoples’ poetry. Â Her most recent book is Unruly Angels was published by Frontenac House and in 2011.
Diane will be reading at the Edmonton “Balanced Brunch†event on April 29. We hope to see you at the Fort Saskatchewan Public Library.
Read more of Diane Buchanan’s poetry:
– October
– Revelation
– The Warp and Woof
– On a Prairie Slough Just Outside the City One Morning Mid-July
– The Secret of Grass
– A Different Kind of Loss – and Finding
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