I'm not the only person in the world who is suffering. I'm trying to talk to the world, responding to those voices.
Dorianne LauxThe more that accrues, the more depth, weight, and breadth we can bring to the poems, which we then need to throw overboard so we don't sink.
Dorianne LauxWe all get habituated, right? You get up in the morning, have your coffee, and read your newspaper, and thatโs great. Everybody loves life in its mundane, daily aspects. Itโs what makes us feel secure. But I also start to go numb a little bit and I donโt see whatโs around me. So I put myself in a new situation and suddenly Iโm really seeing the person next to me, hearing music, and Iโm smelling, and I canโt help but want to write it down.
Dorianne LauxDeath comes to me again, a girl in a cotton slip, barefoot, giggling. Itโs not so terrible she tells me, not like you think, all darkness and silence. There are windchimes and the smell of lemons, some days it rains, but more often the air is dry and sweet. I sit beneath the staircase built from hair and bone and listen to the voices of the living. I like it, she says, shaking the dust from her hair, especially when they fight, and when they sing.
Dorianne LauxI am the flesh boat of my experiences, we all are , my feelings, thoughts, desires and dreams are captured in my body's pliant cells, fastened onto my DNA.
Dorianne LauxSomeone spoke to me last night,/ told me the truth. Just a few words,. but I recognized it./ I knew I should make myself get up,/ Write it down, but it was late,/ and I was exhausted from working/ all day in the garden, moving rocks./ Now, I remember only the flavor--/ not like food, sweet or sharp./ More like a fine powder, like dust./ And I wasn't elated or frightened,/ but simply rapt, aware./ That's how it is sometimes--/ God comes to your window,/ all bright light and black wings,/ and you're just too tired to open it.
Dorianne Laux