24 Dec Poets’ Corner: Two from Rosemerry for Xmas 2024!
Google “last minute Xmas gifts” and 100s of ideas show up, among my favorites: a gift of your time, like offering to babysit for your friends’ progeny; tickets to a concert or sporting event – or both; a charitable donation in a friend or loved one’s name; or one of many books, including books of poetry written, say, by our our favorite Wordwoman, Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer. Jenn (co-owner with husband Brad) just assured us Rosemerry’s work, including her latest book of poems, “The Unfolding,” is available at Telluride’s indie, Between the Covers Bookstore, now located on the sunny side of Main Street at 307 East Colorado Avenue between MiXX Atelier and Practice Yoga.
Please read on to enjoy Rosemerry’s words for the holiday. Her pearls, shimmering holiday gifts from the author’s bottomless, beautiful heart.
Note: Mark your calendar. Rosemerry will be doing a reading on January 13 from “The Unfolding.” The event includes works that inspired her as she was writing the book, also optional ideas for your own writing. Hosted by The Raft. Click here to sign up. And check out meditation teacher Tara Brach’s podcast with Rosemerry about “The Unfolding.”
The first poem, “A Blessing,” was published on December 25, 2023. It appears in Rosemerry’s “A Hundred Falling Veils.” “This one is a blessing for Christmas–doesn’t speak about Christmas, but it is what I sent out ON Christmas last year. This one is for you. And for everyone. May deep peace find us–even in places it seems impossible. Even when it’s beyond our own capacity, may it grow in us, surprise us again and again.”
Rosemerry’s second poem, “Somewhere in the Universe” was also written last year and is available in “The Unfolding.”
Rosemerry,. credit Joanie Schwarz.
A Blessing
And if there is peace to be found,
may it remake you
the way the sunrise
remakes each morning,
the way birdsong
remakes the air,
may peace find you
again and again,
and may it shape
and reshape you
the way the river
creates its bed
simply by flowing.
Somewhere in the Universe
There is this hour when my mother
and daughter and I are side by side
shaping soft red dough into tiny balls
to add to the green spritz wreaths;
the kitchen smells of almond
and butter, and there are carols
on the stereo and it’s going to snow.
Yes, I know there are thousands
of imperfect moments,
but there is also this moment
when I find myself smiling
in a small kitchen in a narrow river valley
in a vast mountain range on a large continent
on a smallish planet in one galaxy among
the hundreds of billions that somehow
all belong to a universe that’s expanding faster
than we think it should—
and as I hum along to a medieval hymn
about how a rose is blooming,
my heart scoured, my heart full,
how is it I, too, am a chord unfolding from minor
to major amid the cold of winter?
How is it I am a rose blooming bright,
faster than I think I should,
this dark season strangely blessed?
From “The Unfolding” (Wildhouse Publishing, 2024)
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