My First Sestina
(I tried one another time and broke the rules because I'd failed to read them properly)
I would love to see others posted here for the exercise.
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Two people stood atop a distant hill.
I saw them as I left today from work,
as soon as I had shut the wooden gate
behind me and had chugged a drink of water.
There was no place I really had to go,
and so I took my time. I didn’t run
the way I sometimes do – I often run
as if life were a race. But on that hill
the silhouetted couple stood. I go
and come the same way every day from work,
taking for granted things like sun and water.
Familiar things get lost. Sometimes a gate
will make me pause and think; a creaking gate
especially so, and sounds of things that run,
like trickling brooks. There is a voice in water
that’s like an echo coming off a hill
where heavy clouds laid down their burdensome work,
and, like me, found their peace in letting go
of weight that binds. The moments come and go
as fast as rabbits rushing toward a gate
in search of freedom. There is always work
enough to keep us feeling on-the-run.
The move toward pleasure always seems up hill,
against the laws that govern running water.
And nothing is alive where there’s no water
that's troubled – living things must come and go.
Stagnation lies beneath a quiet hill
of graves, behind the locking of a gate
in wrought iron stillness. Living things must run.
An idle body has no line of work
to keep its spirit going. Life needs work –
and workers need a living well of water
to keep the heart from fainting as they run.
Recycling seems the only way to go.
Yes life’s a circle, and each of us a gate
that God has set upon his lovely hill.
I bike to work near waterfalls that run.
so brisk and full of life, go through the gate
and drink the sun-rise lilting on the hill.
[This message has been edited by Anne Bryant-Hamon (edited April 17, 2008).]
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