Photo Credit: Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison
Courtesy of Tess Kincaid at Magpie Tales
The Measure of Your Progress
All things want for adjustment,
demand the tightest grip
at the one precise moment
you're most likely to lose
it. Hold on! they always urge,
as if letting go were an option
you had not already considered.
You imagine how shifting gears,
loosening what you've held in
the dark recess of your throat
gone dry in the last week's tumble
of words, could become the measure
of your progress on any given day.
You open your mouth only to wait
for the cue — the wrench of the cap
from pen, notebook poised to take
down whatever's likely to end
this with advice you can live with.
© 2012 Maureen E. Doallas
______________________________
This poem is my response to today's photo prompt at Tess Kincaid's Magpie Tales. Join in by writing your own poem or flash fiction, using as inspiration the photo provided, then go here to add your link and to read the other participating writers' contributions.
Posts
10 comments:
measuring people by their progress is one way to measure. hopefully,not the only one. sometimes external factors keep you from progressing
angular acceleration
verification makes it really hard to comment. you'd get more comments if you turned it off. it took me several times to get this through!!
smiles...loosening what we have held...as our measure of progress....yeah i think that a good measure...as often the letting go allows us that progress....
I go with zongrik about measuring human progress...
Nice take!
JJRod'z
I really like this, Maureen! Read it through several times. We do measure our progress in words, don't we?
My son is a therapist who insists he never gives advice. He feels his job is to facilitate the client's journey to his or her own truth.
Not an easy task, I expect.
=)
Well crafted Maureen, and really gets me thinking about expectations and how we measure this thing called 'progress' and what it really is in the long run. Nicely done.
Oh, wow, I love how the progress through the poem keeps slightly shifting, like the tightening or releasing of gears in a mechanism that needs to move in this patient way. One main metaphor gives over then to writing...and to writing advice...and all seems to be running smoothly again!
Thank you. I definitely need to change gears today. I needed this.
this seemed to speak to me on a much different level. I understand it in terms of having no other option. Making the best of what we've been giving.
Another amazing write Maureen! :-)
Post a Comment