WAITING FOR WANT TO RETURN
by Paula J. Lambert
I imagine myself covered
in the rich, loose soil
of springtime. Loam-y.
An earth-bath. It’s morning,
and the soil is cool. I watch
the sky and wait to bloom,
unafraid.
I see myself rising
in the summer sun, bold.
Thirsty. Sun-dried soil
falling from my shoulders,
feet planted, toes searching
for water as my pores open
to what comes.
In autumn, ripe and ready,
swelling with goodness,
I’m gathered by good people,
hungry and offering thanks.
I nourish them, my bones then
scattered, back to the field.
This, too, is good: winter,
these bones held close
by the frozen mud. I see
myself resting, waiting
for want to return.
IMAGE: “Irises” by Vincent van Gogh (1889).
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Paula J. Lambert is the author of The Sudden Seduction of Gravity (Full/Crescent Press, 2012) and The Guilt That Gathers (Pudding House, 2009). A residency artist for the Ohio Arts Council Arts Learning Program, she has published her work in numerous journals and anthologies. She is a past recipient of an OAC Individual Artist Fellowship and was a resident fellow at the Virginia Center for Creative Arts. Her MFA is from Bowling Green State University. Lambert currently resides in Dublin, Ohio, with her husband Michael Perkins, with whom she operates Full/Crescent Press, a small but growing independent publisher of poetry books and broadsides.
Silver Birch Press 
Such a lovely poem! 🙂
I love this poem.
When I wrote the poem, I was not sure it was something I could send out–I thought of it as a sort of imaginative meditation and wasn’t sure it “worked” beyond that. I so appreciate the piece being shared here, and so appreciate the comments. Thank you.