This moment before tumbling
By Terri Miller

There is a cavernous obscurity

That fills thought like the moment of blindness at the dousing of bright light.

It arrives grasping from the center of psyche,

Then pulls at the edges to inside me out.

Here living memories arise,

Emergent dreams akin to ancient fishes escaping the aquifer for arid soil,

Drug to the serrated fissure over which I peek.

This hanging, teetering mind waits as a butterfly between breaths of wind.

Hypnotic dangling mesmerizes

And I find myself immobile as an eave strung icicle.

The arctic quiet threads a path through my veins

Whispering catch me … if you can.

Upon the moment before tumbling just now I think

I will fly! … anticipation - plunge!

Grasping at the nothing which stirs below,

Vapored whirlpools of mist like spinning wool threads,

Life's thrumming rhythm pulsing as a dog's leg to the flea,

A chord struck feeling spurs feathered limbs to fly.

But still IT lies,

Thin ice whose subtle cracks within are silently widening,

Rush, rush, rushing across a crackled sheet

And crowds in close like rising heat.

The unknown thing.

It gapes.

It gapes…at me.

Quick

Fade to black!

Put to rest, to wait, to come again,

Familiar nightly muse.

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