Poets United Midweek Motif ~ Bridge

 

     

        “Build bridges not walls”— Suzy Kassem

SOURCE

“Poetry isn’t an island, it is the bridge. 
Poetry isn’t a ship, it is the lifeboat. 
Poetry isn’t swimming. Poetry is water.” 
― Kamand Kojouri

         Midweek Motif ~ Bridge

Bridge fills up the in between empty / awkward space and helps to cross over. Bridges over small freeway or deep gorge or huge water way have always made our journeys smooth.

Though I have seen in videos terrified tourists screaming in fear while walking on the China Glass Bridge with its crack effect, bridges as such are of absolutely amazing structural magnificence.

In the tarot the bridge card means connections, assistance, stability and progress: it’s a symbol of hope.

However bridges also are silent witnesses to unfortunate happenings. Ambrose Bierce’s An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge or Thomas Hood’s Bridge of Sighs dwell on such events.

Write a Bridge poem today.

Sharing a few poems here on Bridge:

The Bridge

by Octavio Paz

Between now and now,

between I am and you are,

the word bridge.

Entering it

you enter yourself:

the world connects

and closes like a ring.

From one bank to another,

there is always

a body stretched:

a rainbow.

I’ll sleep beneath its arches.

The Iron Bridge

by Billy Collins

I am standing on a disused iron bridge
that was erected in 1902,
according to the iron plaque bolted into a beam,
the year my mother turned one.
Imagine--a mother in her infancy,
and she was a Canadian infant at that,
one of the great infants of the province of Ontario.

But here I am leaning on the rusted railing
looking at the water below,
which is flat and reflective this morning,
sky-blue and streaked with high clouds,
and the more I look at the water,
which is like a talking picture,
the more I think of 1902
when workmen in shirts and caps
riveted this iron bridge together
across a thin channel joining two lakes
where wildflowers blow along the shore now
and pairs of swans float in the leafy coves.

1902--my mother was so tiny
she could have fit into one of those oval
baskets for holding apples,
which her mother could have lined with a soft cloth
and placed on the kitchen table
so she could keep an eye on infant Katherine
while she scrubbed potatoes or shelled a bag of peas,

the way I am keeping an eye on that cormorant
who just broke the glassy surface
and is moving away from me and the iron bridge,
swiveling his curious head,
slipping out to where the sun rakes the water
and filters through the trees that crowd the shore.

And now he dives,
disappears below the surface,
and while I wait for him to pop up,
I picture him flying underwater with his strange wings,

as I picture you, my tiny mother,
who disappeared last year,
flying somewhere with your strange wings,
your wide eyes, and your heavy wet dress,
kicking deeper down into a lake
with no end or name, some boundless province of water. 

 Mirabeau Bridge

by Guillaume Apollinaire

Under Mirabeau Bridge the river slips away
And lovers
Must I be reminded
Joy came always after pain

The night is a clock chiming
The days go by not I

We're face to face and hand in hand
While under the bridges
Of embrace expire
Eternal tired tidal eyes

The night is a clock chiming
The days go by not I

Love elapses like the river
Love goes by
Poor life is indolent
And expectation always violent

The night is a clock chiming
The days go by not I

The days and equally the weeks elapse
The past remains the past
Love remains lost
Under Mirabeau Bridge the river slips away

The night is a clock chiming
The days go by not I 

Please share your new poem using Mr. Linky below and visit others in the spirit of the community—

              (Next week Susan’s Midweek Motif will be ~ Gardens)