Saturday, September 29, 2007

Swimming Pools and Dragon Flies

It’s not that I don’t like the water;
I just don’t like to swim.

I don’t like water in my nose and ears
And if I let myself think too much,
I don’t like imagining all the fluids in the pool from the other bodies in it.

But this morning all the stars lined up and I got in the pool at the Shangri-La.

The changing room was close by
The water and air the right temperature
The morning shaded light perfect
And hardly any other bodies in sight.

So I lay on my back
Suspended in the water
Refreshed by the morning breeze
Surrounded by the fragrance of tropical flowers.

As I watched the clouds roll by a crescent moon
And followed the patterns of the palm fronds against the sky
I realized that if I lay perfectly still
Dragon flies will alight on me.

2 comments:

livewithinwords said...

Hi Ammayi,
As always, the image of dragonflies and swimming pools is powerful enough to make this my favourite piece so far. Though I will say that plot wise, I like wrinkles.
I'm so happy you created this blog, so please keep transferring from the notebook to here (you can skip the word files now unless you have a work-in-progress).

ramkelath said...

I really enjoyed this poem - your voice is just about perfect in it. Personal, but with just the right level of detail and abstraction.

So you don't like to swim - who knew?