I.
sitting at the dining room table,
waiting as he writes
slowly,
as he checks the spelling
of each word.
feeling into the discomfort
before it propels me
out of my chair,
I begin to breathe
in and out,
slowly,
over and over.
this is life.
gathered around the fire,
we look into each other’s eyes
reminiscing about our life in China1,
underneath the stars,
our fingers sticky
from
melted marshmallows
and memories.
this is life.
II.
III.
{cento}2 a tale for the time being3
if you dry your tears,
you will understand what i’m saying.
our feeling of alive
has no real edge or boundary
possibilities open
nothing in the world
is real or solid
continuous
separate
flowing.
a time being
a life.
not knowing is the most intimate way.
IV.
there’s room for you, too -
filled with delight
be the way,
be your way.
This poem was born from a prompt that Kat Farrell-Davis shared on her substack: The Poetry Journals. In her prompt was the simple, yet delightful invitation to find words or fragments from a recent book that you enjoyed and craft a cento from them.
All of the fragments and words contained in this poem came from the book: A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki. It was a beautiful story that I highly recommend!
Always inspiring Gina, and the cento invitation sounds so fun. I love this concept of connecting fragments, it resonates deeply and I feel it’s something that could help me connect my own writing strands 🍄
Always a joy to read your careful words Gina x