“Quick, Now, Here, Now, Always –“
for Nora
Think of it as a long slow bank & descent,
a plane curling light as air through cumulus.
The slide & jive of jetting through ice crystals.
(They say that’s what clouds are made of.)
There, there’s the earth as seen from up above
a bright mosaic giving way from time to time
to glittering clusters of cities
& water, always water.
Its embrace of land so clear from up here,
how one fits hand in glove with the other.
(Remember how we used to swim & swim?)
Swaths of houses sit trim & undistressed.
Byways course like veins through the body
of the country, a cantata of light & speed.
Vehicles the size of childhood toys zip along
shining paths towards their destinations.
The living world moving in unison…complete.
I say this to you. Look! Look down.
It is so beautiful. You have lived here.
It is waiting for you. Land.
–Miranda Beeson
Dear David,
Of course the title is from Eliot’s Four Quartets.
The epigraph is for my mother, Nora.
I wrote this poem for her towards the end of her time with Alzheimer’s.
I was trying to find some way to encourage her—to let go.
& she finally did.
The poem is on p.79 of my recent book Wildlife (Spuyten Duyvil).
I’m doing readings for the book all over this summer—some kind
of post-pandemic blossoming.
With thanks for your kind invitation to appear in the BAP blog.
Miranda
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Miranda Beeson is a poet, teacher & editor. Her most recent collection of poems is Wildlife (Spuyten Duyvil). She has been teaching creative writing and literature at Stony Brook University, where she completed her MFA. As an editor, she works with poets on the creative arc of their manuscripts. Look for sonnets from her forthcoming book FIELD in the current issue of Hole In The Head Review.
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Author: The Best American Poetry
