Friday, October 16, 2009

Flying Inside Your Own Body

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FLYING INSIDE YOUR OWN BODY
by Margaret Atwood

Your lungs fill & spread themselves,
wings of pink blood, and your bones
empty themselves and become hollow.
When you breathe in you'll lift like a balloon
and your heart is light too & huge,
beating with pure joy, pure helium.
The sun's white winds blow through you,
there's nothing above you,
you see the earth now as an oval jewel,
radiant & seablue with love.
It's only in dreams you can do this.
Waking, your heart is a shaken fist,
a fine dust clogs the air you breathe in;
the sun's a hot copper weight pressing straight
down on the thin pink rind of your skull.
It's always the moment just before gunshot.
You try & try to rise but you cannot.

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Margaret Atwood speaks the language of my head best. I try to go on anyway.

Other poems by Margaret Atwood here.

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