Bouncing Between Beds with Song by Marjorie Maddox (ONE GOOD MEMORY Series)

Bouncing Between Beds with Song
by Marjorie Maddox

“Let’s go fly a kite, up to the highest height…” Mary Poppins

See the magnolia bursting
with what could be and the blue-grey
two-story shy beside it? There,
go in now, up the stairs and back too many years

into what could be, into the blue-grey
and stair-stepping into the long hallway of age,
go in now, staring full-face all the many years
that separate adult’s bed from child’s dream.

Two-stepping down the long hallway of age,
here where you cannot stand still—
between adult’s bed and child’s dream—
this is where you learned to fly.

There is a time you cannot stand still,
a time to leap from the blue-grey hall.
This is where your voice learned to fly
bursting from throat through song, through story,

each time leaping from the blue-grey hall,
“up, up into the atmosphere” of movies,
bursting from throat through song, through story,
“up, up where the air is clear,” Mary Poppins humming.

“Up, Up”—the atmosphere expanding as you moved
into each new sphere, past flying the kite, past the kite itself,
“up, up, where the air is clear,” beyond Mary Poppins. Humming
yourself into belief, away from the world below

into each new sphere, past flying the kite, past the kite itself,
into the more real sky, the universe itself, all that was waiting
of yourself. What you believed flew away from the world below
with loud singing past the rooftops and soot-filled chimneys

into the more real sky, the universe itself, all that was waiting.
Dashing down the long hallway, you bounce on one bed, then the other
with loud singing, past the rooftops and soot-filled chimneys,
past the Mary Poppins stories— childhood

dashed. Down the long hallway, past the beds, the other
self waits. There are always two stories. There
the blue-grey of what was. Over there,
what could be, every magnolia bursting.

Previously published in SWWIM, The Orchards Poetry Review, and How to Write a Form Poem, ed. Tania Runyan (T. S. Poetry Press 2020).

PAINTING: Magnolias by Lolame.

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: Here is  a link to an interview about writing this particular poem:

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Professor of English at Lock Haven University, Marjorie Maddox has published 13 collections of poetry—including Transplant, Transport, Transubstantiation (Yellowglen Prize), Begin with a Question (Paraclete, International Book Award Winner), and Heart Speaks, Is Spoken For (Shanti Arts) — an ekphrastic collaboration with photographer Karen Elias—the short story collection What She Was Saying (Fomite); four children’s and YA books—including Inside Out: Poems on Writing and Reading Poems with Insider Exercises (Finalist International Book Awards), A Crossing of Zebras: Animal Packs in Poetry; I’m Feeling Blue, Too! (a 2021 NCTE Notable Poetry Book), and Rules of the Game: Baseball Poems , Common Wealth: Contemporary Poets on Pennsylvania (co-editor). In the Museum of My Daughter’s Mind, based on her daughter’s paintings (www.hafer.work), + works by other artists, is forthcoming in 2023 (Shanti Arts). Visit her at  marjoriemaddox.com.

Author photo by Melania Rae.