Every Day
The mind wants multi-faceted diamonds,
clean cut on many sides, a stone measured
in brilliance, measured by how the light touches it.
Like how turning an idea can catch light,
bounce it in another direction, like how an idea
forgotten can still be lit again. Even diamonds
with inclusions reflect the light that shines on them.
In the 1800s they mined diamonds and cut them
with respect to how candle light would flounce
on the diamond’s many faces. The mind wants that.
The body wants stone fruit, sun in the orchard.
Day after day, a pollinator arrives
and white flowers open,
every day the juice of fruit touches my tongue,
and every day my tongue knows my mouth
better than I know most things.
I want to be like my tongue,
soft movement through the dark known places
with confidence. To rest and receive the light when,
like lips parting, the sun rises.
clean cut on many sides, a stone measured
in brilliance, measured by how the light touches it.
Like how turning an idea can catch light,
bounce it in another direction, like how an idea
forgotten can still be lit again. Even diamonds
with inclusions reflect the light that shines on them.
In the 1800s they mined diamonds and cut them
with respect to how candle light would flounce
on the diamond’s many faces. The mind wants that.
The body wants stone fruit, sun in the orchard.
Day after day, a pollinator arrives
and white flowers open,
every day the juice of fruit touches my tongue,
and every day my tongue knows my mouth
better than I know most things.
I want to be like my tongue,
soft movement through the dark known places
with confidence. To rest and receive the light when,
like lips parting, the sun rises.
Origin Story
A calligrapher dips a pen
into a well of ink filled to the brim
and holds thick paper in place on the desk.
Ink covers the nib and then the page.
Musing on ink’s origin,
I consider this drop’s journey
along the ascender of the letter M--
a thin hairline upstroke from the nib’s scratchy
ascent across the page. I listen
for evidence of sentience, fallen pine branch
before crackling into soot, into sumi ink.
The other day my son said he hoped to remember
all the joys and sorrows of this life in his next.
I think ink must remember its time as pine.
All of our stories
innumerable marks etched on trees with trees.
One dip after another,
one innumerable dip into the well
after another.
into a well of ink filled to the brim
and holds thick paper in place on the desk.
Ink covers the nib and then the page.
Musing on ink’s origin,
I consider this drop’s journey
along the ascender of the letter M--
a thin hairline upstroke from the nib’s scratchy
ascent across the page. I listen
for evidence of sentience, fallen pine branch
before crackling into soot, into sumi ink.
The other day my son said he hoped to remember
all the joys and sorrows of this life in his next.
I think ink must remember its time as pine.
All of our stories
innumerable marks etched on trees with trees.
One dip after another,
one innumerable dip into the well
after another.
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Lindsey Wayland is a poet, calligrapher, and researcher. Wayland is a poetry MFA candidate at Pacific University where is a merit scholarship recipient. She was a finalist for the 2024 Patricia Cleary Miller Award for Poetry by New Letters. Her poetry has been published in Southern Humanities Review, Bellevue Literary Review, and the Haiku Society of America. She lives in Port Townsend, Washington with her husband and their three children. Find her online at www.lindseywayland.com.
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