Posted on by Allison Marie Conway

Tempt the Tides

Fire flickers in my chest, I feel its heavy heat as I look up into the bluegray sky, dark with promise, thick with secrets I keep to myself.

The wind is shaking the trees, hard and stiff they sway from the pressure. The invisible air makes a crushing sound against my window pane, pushing, pushing, roughing up the atmosphere like a shoving into and out of place.

We learn to shift. We learn to lose. We learn to surrender. We learn our flexibility and our strength. I think of lovers who have moved me, startled me, awakened me.

Wanting something else. The recklessness of that. To dare the wreckage of that. To tempt the pain. Tempt the tides. Bend the waves.

He speaks to me in silence. I come to him in the same manner, hauntingly still. Desperately eager, hungry, empty, alert. I know what I want. I know I have not found it yet.

Or no, that isn’t quite right. I have caught glimpses of it.

Felt its soft black feathers swinging in the soft flesh of my throat, my breast, my center. The words which unlock my timidity. My experience of the truth sometimes feels like begging, pleading.

I have dreams where I cannot find the way, door after door, hallway into hallway, endlessly. I hate it and I trust it. The only way is no way at all. The only way is never ending and alone.

Perhaps as poets we know only to reach out for phantom things.

Open our mouths against the words which may or may not come.

What would you die for. What does it look like. What does it feel like.

It isn’t what they told you, is it. It is never like they told you.

You cannot name it. But god, how you bleed for it, seek for it.

This exquisiteness you swear you’re made of

vanishing inside

behind the burning sun.

 

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Photo by Pietro Tebaldi

31 Replies to “Tempt the Tides”

  1. Pingback: Tempt the Tides — Allison Marie Conway – Midst Blog

  2. I don’t need to go too long on my comment, Allison. Suffice it to say that I was absolutely moved by reading your excellent text. It is truly remarkable and written with that impeccable style of yours, always attached to your poetic universe… A universe full of experiences and beauty that seems to persist in a plane prior to your memory and to all tides.

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      1. I feel having found your blog. You are not only beautiful as hell in your picture in the “About” page, but that inner beauty of yours shows too through your words. That’s the PERFECT combination I always look in people and find it so rarely. I’m new and will continue to read your posts. 💖🌹

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          1. Actually I am interested in knowing a bit more about you i.e. when did you feel free or bold enough to start sharing your soul’s depths with the world? I found that strength at the age of 46 and now I feel like having lost all those years to share this awesome life, its feelings and rewards/losses through words.

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            1. Thank you for your thoughtful question, it has given me pause to think. When I was 27 years old my mother passed away, she was young, and I was deeply affected by this. I decided that I would never hold back my desire to find my voice, to speak my soul. That experience gave me every reason to push past my fears, to cherish life while we have it. I am so very happy that you have also found your strength in words. We are blessed indeed. ❤

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              1. I feel sad and sorry about your mother passing away. I still have my mom by my side and can’t think of this world without her, thankfully. One more question if you don’t mind me asking too many… lols 🙂 This is my standard question everyone new I meet in person or virtually. Have you written somewhere about your experience of loving a total stranger (not your family)? How has your soul felt loving someone deep enough to the extent of almost losing yourself?

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                1. Thank you for your kindness, Amir, I am grateful. ❤ And you ask very interesting questions, this one touched me very much. I have written such a piece, you can read it here at this link if you like. https://wp.me/p80hww-gI It is called "For the One Come Back to Life" which I wrote for a poet friend whom I loved dearly, and he had passed away before we ever could meet. I will tell you my soul feels everlasting yearning for more of his poetry, his vision. There are some stranger souls who are part of you so intimately, it is so rare. It cannot be explained only felt… Even thinking on it now pierces my heart. Thank you for listening. ❤

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                  1. I have had stalkers, hence I’d make sure I don’t continue to stalk you with my questions. LOL. 💖🌹😍 I totally enjoyed such a deep and a passionate tribute of yours to another poet who has sadly passed away to a place where you and I are also headed to and I’m sure he is waiting there for you guys to meet 🙂 A feely and a poetess with a fragile heart like yours can’t possibly be in love with only one poet, or anything this universe has to offer. I’d love to continue reading more of your art-work. Even though that tribute of yours was beautiful beyond words, but I was more interested in knowing your heart’s words when you went through finding, living and losing a soul and a body that you loved from up-close, right next to your body and soul. If its too much private thing to ask, please ignore since this cat still continues to stay alive despite curiosity having threatened to kill it. ha ha ha 🙂 😜💕🥰🌹

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                    1. Thank you, Amir, for your kind thoughts and comments. I will take a little break for now. 🙂 I am so touched and grateful that you have been moved by my work, especially a piece which is so intimate for me. Blessings and light to you. And thank you again. ❤ ❤

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