Ronna Bloom: A Poem

Ronna Bloom
ARS POETICA

I write poems for money ––

where the giving over

is immediate, before the fact

of the poem, the hill-climb of heart,

the pillage of cells, the language

eruption. It is all and only

in response. The conversation

with silence tapped out

like an invisible ink, held to light.

The cash – a dollar or a thousand –

simply the glow I'm held to;

the person saying: ‘Do it for me.

Here is my door ­–– will you

open it? Hold it open for me to enter?

Will you leave me there alone?’

When the poem is written and I am gone,

it is in the hands of the lover,

as a lover leaves another behind

with the satisfaction and grief

of their own life, shared,

but taken back ultimately

into their skin. It was

always yours. I only held it

up to the light, I only

saw it flickering, caught it like a

moth in my hand and

gave it back.

Ronna Bloom

(from Queen's Quarterly by permission of the author)

Ronna Bloom is a writer, teacher, psychotherapist, and author of five books of poetry. She is Poet in Community to the University of Toronto and Poet in Residence at Mount Sinai Hospital. Pedlar Press will publish her sixth book of poems in October. www.ronnabloom.com