| School of the World By Maureen Ash Late evening the car hits ice on a curve, slides toward the chasm but there’s gravel, the tires grab, you breathe, drive home, carry groceries in under the moon’s thin silver feather, sweet winter cold fresh as water on your face. You have been a disappointment, you failed, left an essential task undone, caused harm, it is too late, you can’t—won’t—can never—and then you awaken, this gray light is dawn, it was a dream, just a dream, you rise from twisted sheets breathing hard with the new day ahead, such a gift you could take it in your arms and kiss its delicate edges. And in spring the tree that looked dead furs itself in blossoms, your lost cat returns, the bug on your rosebush is harmless, even pretty. Relief after dread, joy after sadness. Not always but sometimes, enough that hope’s faint starlight draws your gaze and you see in a crowd the face that is like a new leaf, like a scent of roses in winter, like a child’s fever lifting. Here, schooled by luck, beauty, and love in this world you now find a heart beating as if it had been taught exactly the rhythm of yours. |
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