Today brings another poetry episode of Voices of the Tongass. Berett Wilber's collection of poetry,Lesser Known Marine Mammal's Lesser Known Love Songs, is inspired by her life in Southeast Alaska. To hear Berett read hear poem, TheContingencies of Chance, scroll to the bottom of this post.
the contingencies of chance
where does the outside end?
when the air enters your lungs?
in the beds of your fingernails?
let yourself feel
terrified.
up against the edges
of your skin, fear
will rip your lungs into sails,
tear down the lines between things and
collapse you.
breathe yourself in:
the scent of lilacs at night,
the silver of the river at our ankles:
the oxygen in your blood is
already just air
and so you are
already just everywhere.
we are vessels, pitchers, open bowls
and the sheer strain of living
tears holes in us
that we cannot repair ourselves.
we can only fill each other:
give yourself away.
(you become hollow if you
board yourself up
if the walls inside of you echo,
splinter through them).
the tiny sutures of your eyes,
your voice: rope yourself to the world.
it will stain you irreparably and you
will build yourself into it,
stretching spindly bridges
until they crumble and fall.
in the moments
where you have to strip back the paper
of your walls, and
raze the scaffolding of your life
to the ground -
curse if you must.
but if you would like to keep yourself alive,
open your mouth
and pour yourself out.
the world will never demand less of you.
we were not meant to stand empty for long.
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