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Poetry
by Nicola Winstanley
Seeing Andromeda
You saw Andromeda through binoculars
like breath in the night sky, dissolving
and felt the universe expanding from
the frayed edges of the lake on Manitoulin
where you stood, head back, eyes open. I
looked up too, but couldn’t see it, only
the curve of the earth on the horizon,
and felt the rock beneath my feet, the way
it held me there. The hard pull of it.
You said I shouldn’t be afraid, that I
should feel awe and revel in the mystery,
wonder at my smallness and know
how precious it is, this tiny thing, my
life, my beating heart. I should consider
the minuteness of human matter and
how little it means, “You know,
in the greater scheme of things,” you said.
“And doesn’t it make you feel better?”
But better feeling is sunrise swimming
in the lake with Sam, a precious, tiny thing
that matters. He holds me to the earth
without hardness. We float, suspended,
expanding from the inside, our beating
hearts. He looks up at me, and I can see
new galaxies there: in his breath
dissolving in the cool air as it rises
from the water.
[Distillate © HA&L + Nicola Winstanley | {from the Greek bios} -- the course of a life.]
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