Storymania - Coming of Age by Elizabeth A Raap

Coming of Age, A Collection of Verse
Elizabeth A Raap

Coming of Age

I am old
aged, yet there is a second coming now
here in the drifting death of days of autumn
here in walking alone along the shores of a Great Lake
my stomach cramps.

Why when reams of pain have shifted my body
in births and deaths
Why when I have felt my mind burn and reseed
in loves and losses

Why when I may live indifferent in a castle of sand

Now the sight today of the little waves, the half waves
folding themselves over and over
makes my abdomen cramp
This is the second coming

It is not redemption, not damnation, not completion, not peace.

It is knowing I cannot walk upon the water, not this vessel
But upon me it treads instead
It is knowing I cannot absorb the ending long shadows as the water
But it is me they seek to see their own changes

upon my body, upon my body

It is this second coming that seeps with passion
while the moon comes over the sky though the sun still holds.

The Swing Set

In middle mornings crisp, I a child
stood by the great red and white king
my mother, large hands on knees and smiling,
sang out go
from the steps so white and shining
and then she took a step farther back
and sang out go
and I went, slink-stepping
in those middle mornings

In busy late mornings, I a child
went out to the great red and white king
and sat with folded hands to converse with him
the sun was neat and clean on him
the paint was rich and gay on him
looked real nice
and I told him so of course
then went back inside
in those late mornings

in the afternoons I was a child
I went to the great red and white king
and told him and the willow I would fly on him
above to where the willow could not see
so I took myself
and pushed myself
and I did fly
and I shrieked to the king and I was his queen
singing go as though my chest should burst

mom just stood through in the window and watched from the corner or her eye

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The silence piled as the day quicken to dusk
never holding the air, it fled into the day
never moved by the thin quickness that bore thick dusk
never lush, never dead, never aware
but undimmed

The snow piled as the day dropped its light
always like banks of soil
always holding its roots
always giving its own darkness
it moved with shallow quickness

In the greatness of pure blue winter the silence settles
In the pure lonely grace winter the snow settles
in the mild sleep of infinite dusks

Both give themselves to fall to cedars
yet in whose hands will they wane