'A bridge across our fears'

 

"Poetry is not only dream and vision; it is the skeleton architecture of our lives.  It lays the foundations for a future of change, a bridge across our fears of what has never been before."  Audre Lorde

Born in February of 1934, Lorde’spowerful poems primarily deal with civil rights, feminism, and Black femaleidentity.   She also wrote and spoke eloquently about battlingcancer, a disease from which she died at age 58.    For Saturday’s Poem here is Lorde’s,

 

Coping

Ithas rained for five days
running
the world is
a round puddle
of sunless water
where small islands
are only beginning
to cope
a young boy
in my garden
is bailing out water
from his flower patch
when I ask him why
he tells me
young seeds that have not seen sun
forget
and drown easily.