Sestina: Home and Homing
Glimpses of a Mental Traveller
My home is not at all a common place
No well-walked way leads close at all to there
No noise of traffic will disrupt the ear
The seasons do not change from spring to fall
Perhaps the ringing of some far-off bell
Will give a sign of life that lives nearby
II
And oh the love that I shall there live by!
In dreams and daydreams I can glimpse this place
Before I’m rudely wakened by the bell
The magic in your sparkling eyes is there
Your tumbling, auburn hair does fairly fall
The slightest sound cannot escape your ear
III
To all your thoughts and thinkments I’ll give ear
The undulating rhythms I’ll live by
Is there a house built o’er a waterfall?
Is there a keen existence without place?
Is there a where or when if there’s no there?
I launch myself towards you with a bell
IV
In noisesome days there sounds a single bell
It’s often missed by too distracted ear
A pitch that reaches here from other there
In frenzied life time passes quickly by
We scurry purposeless from place to place
Before we know, young spring turns soon to fall
V
You left so soon— you did untimely fall
I knew not why, when tolled that cruel bell
Who’ll tell me why I was left in this place?
One half a whole, one hand, one lonesome ear
This solitary heart must needs get by
And who is there to guard you when you’re there?
VI
I understand it’s not a time or there
I think there’s gentle roar of waterfall
And graceful, leaping figures dance nearby
A fiery light and softly singing bell
The sound of crickets might well greet the ear
I’ll home in to, beyond all time and place
Tornada
The bell will lead my homing, eager ear
To place that’s not a place and not a there
I’ll fall to you and never say goodbye
About the Creator
Paul Merkley
Co-Founder of Seniors Junction, a social enterprise working to prevent seniors isolation. Emeritus professor, U. of Ottawa. Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. Founder of Tower of Sound Waves. Author of Fiction.
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