Ellen Porter
7/31/07
At Bay

The journey through this
cluttered, wild terrain
the pathway strewn with
fear and joy and exaltation
this journey buoys me up
fascinated by windward, unsuspected detritus.

My body holds the fear
the tender gifts at bay
one brief horror after another
one decorated birdsong
cradled, clay-formed, stuffed in waiting pockets,
held at bay.

And I wonder
what bay holds my delight
my terrors, sprung loose and trembling.
What bay is this—water, ice,
the sound of a neglected boat
left banging against the water-worn pier?

And what God wanders with me
knowing the paths I will follow
The tight strung corners I will turn?
Or maybe not knowing,
Maybe God follows along,
a bright and curious journeyer
caught up in the golden, the bleak,
the day’s terrible and brilliant surprises.


Ellen Porter
8/6/070
Fallow Days

Some mornings
rising early
perhaps too early for that

particular day,
I follow my routine:
swallowing pills, checking blood sugar

injecting insulin.
And then yogurt and
the first, delectable cup of coffee

creamy brown and hot.
Next reading the poets
of the moment:

Mary Oliver and Jane Kenyon
enriched by their metaphors
jealous of their consistent excellence

I pick up pen and paper
and try to stir the ink
in directions of beauty.

On some of these days,
following the first sips of coffee,
it is better to return to bed

return to dream space
until the sky is bright
and the new light, ready.


Ellen Porter
7/9/07
House Plants at the Priory

Twelve years by the window
parent to forty plants
and I don’t know its name, its lineage.

The purple knobby green, forgiving, dry
leaves folded on themselves
clutching water until
I see and fill.

And then it opens wide
branches arching with an ancient pleasure
adorning the corner
coveting light.

Ivy and philodendron ignore
my watering scheme
waiting
flourishing
until I tend their souls.

A task of awe
terrible
to be responsible for life,
life so reliant as this,
these twelve fragile years.


Ellen Porter
8/23/07
My Fingers Quiver

My fingers quiver as I
balance the book of poets
on my palms, searching
out the beauty, the hidden
source of words made holy,
the pools of undifferentiated light.

Some days my malleable soul
leaps laughing into the nutritive soup
of creativity. And poems
lift from the paper, alive with an
energy distilled from
air and moon, and shadowed oaks.

But other days,
the soul lies dormant,
paralyzed by outer fiats
demanding uniformity, demure peace,
painful, grotesque similarity.
It sets my spirit quivering.

No words can form a poem
issuing from trembling hands. No?
But wait!
The trembling itself may lend the
fragile impetus, the threadbare creativity.
Quick, don’t let the fingers rest!
The trembling, the trembling.


Ellen Porter
8/17/07
Separate Grief

At first dawn,
the light promised but not yet given,
less oxygen is required
from the air of this house:
the potter died last night.

His disease, my own,
I stood wondering in my room,
wondering to what solitude I could escape
while others mourned their secret grief
around his bed.

You came into my room,
not knowing me well,
but well enough,
and offered—
no, urged—
your hospitality.
You took me silently, in strength
and the stamina of orchids drinking air,
and led me to your house next door.
You let me choose a room
and you let me linger in solitude.

A few hours later, my heart settled
back to the center of my belly,
I turned and, receiving your kiss on my cheek,
the seal of a vow,
I reached across the graveled lot and ventured home.


Ellen Porter
5/26/07
Suspended Between

I am living this new day
not dying.

Tiny things that I can do,
I do alone,
spinning energy, defying sloth.
I can write a poem at dawn,
can pull my quilt, handmade, personal,
taut and even across the abandoned bed.
I can return cloth napkins to their basket and
hide the salt and pepper behind cupboard doors.

But I cannot sweep the floor,
buy fresh vegetables at the local market,
light the candles or the stove
(oxygen sustains my necessary breath)
I cannot drive the car or
enjoy the privacy of showering alone.

I am living this new day
and dying.

Each moment etches new designs
against my soul.


Ellen Porter
9/2/07
What God Intended

Are there moments
in this earthbound journey
when we slip smoothly
between this world and the next—
moments when we become
perfectly what God intended?

I have felt those moments
at sunrise on glacial peaks;
in the ocean, the waves insouciant,
bearing me above shark and shale;
wandering, stunned beneath the
giant redwoods called sequoia.

But they do not last,
these moments of joyful mystery.
These perfect moments pulling me on
and pulling me on
until one day, I will slide
smoothly out of this world
and perfectly, permanently,
as God intended,
slip into the next one singing.