Featured Poem of the Week

Susan Brearly

She brings with her, wisdom, experience, and the gift of gab within various forms of writing. She is unafraid to share what needs to be shared, regardless of its content. What she has given to A Cornered Gurl cannot be described. With each piece, new eyes set their sights on our small community and there’s no doubt that we will continue to grow. Her poem Syncopation is this week’s feature.

Syncopation

Ah, my heart.
Jumping, fluttering, pausing
In syncopation.

A defect, 
modern science informs.

Lying still 
hear it, feel it
Reminding
every moment
This is the SPARK

Life, the gift

Death lingers, 
lingers in the pause, the void,
between this beat and the next.

A child’s terror
Knowing.

Listen
MY BREATH, MY HEART
It stopped.

No, they say. 
Your mind, it’s there.

Again. 
Again.
Again.
Night after night.
Terror.
Certainty.
Death is near.
Death is here.

Passion’s embrace.
Remember, heart says.
You are fragile
in this flutter
in this pause
in this deep murmur, the silence in the space between breaths,
an echo chamber of the universe
that whispers, “death is near, death is here.”

Whispering, “choose . . .”
Life?
Or Death?

I choose to move.

I run.

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Thanks, Jennifer Kindera for this great article

*Children who are telling you about their very real physical experiences need empathy and the full gift of your attention and time. Believe them; believe in them.

---

Originally published in A Cornered Gurl via Medium.