An idle hand’s a devil’s tool.

No sweat to balance bliss.

A craftsman or a softened fool-

Which will you reminisce?

---

“At dawn, when you have trouble getting out of bed, tell yourself: ‘I have to go to work—as a human being. What do I have to complain of, If I'm going to do what I was born for—the things I was brought into the world to do?’” — Marcus Aurelius, Emperor of Rome.

So which will it be? Would you like to earn your life or spend it? When you look back through your years, which will bring you more regret- years of purpose? or years adrift, without commitment?

It’s hard to tell sometimes- am I being dumb or brave? Am I being smart or cowardly? Do I take the difficult path, even though others point out its difficulty? Or do I take the paved road, patient and hopeful that time will bring me satisfaction? Or do I seek that out myself?

© Aimee Wood 2022

Oh patron of the bardic arts,

Come rhyme, come ride along.

Fly swan upon a breeze of hearts,

And barter hope for song.

---

Poetry writing, its highs and lows and frustrations, feels like transfiguring my own feelings and small hopes and despairs into words, trapping a feeling into a verse. This dreamy poem is an invitation- to be syrupy, cheesy, to ‘fly swan upon a breeze of hearts’ and not worry that you might be common, to revel in the common, to sing and flow when you prefer to wallow. Swan is another word for troubadour, or minstrel- so come patron! Tempt your muse! Barter your hope for a song to sway to on the more difficult afternoons.

© Aimee Wood 2022

My needle pulls the thread of me,

Each day one stitch, one try.

I’ll weave a worthy tapestry,

No day will pass me by.

---

This sentiment, to have no lost days, comes from this mortal desire to count time as it passes- but count too closely and you might have words with the Mistress. I think the careful and intentional use of one’s days, is the only way to build something larger than your single day can accomplish. You are but one day of Yourself, in a long, continuous line of Yous. You perish this very evening when your head hits the pillow What else can you do with your single allotted day of life, than help the next You along, and thank the Yous that came before? Together, you might weave a tapestry that survives all of you. Certainly if you do not try you will not.

© Aimee Wood 2022

‘Sleep with the sun, not moon, my dear.

Save starlight for Beltane.

A debt of sand is one to fear,

Best pay your tax in grain.’

---

It does not do to dwell on time ‘wasted’ on sleep. Such time, given it is spent at the appropriate hours, allows for the remaining grains of sand in your day to be of higher quality. A debt of sleep is something you cannot pay down with time- instead it saps your very life, days wasted with lethargy in favor of nights misplaced. In this poem, Beltane, a holiday celebrated betwixt the spring equinox and the summer solstice, is a stand in for holy days in general- those special occasions like New Year’s Eve or Birthdays, where, almost ritually, the night is pierced by our wakefulness, by our observance. To protect these vigilant nights, to honor them with intention, they must be infrequent, or they will mean nothing at all. As always, the quotation marks in this poem indicate that I am not the one speaking- this is my Mistress Time with her own advice- I am not perfect at preserving nights for sleep, and this little rhyme acts as a reminder to do better.

© Aimee Wood, 2022

Oh! With such ease, these barehands bruise,

Affection’s like a glove.

As like to fit as it’s to lose,

I’m nervous now, in love.

---

It was hard, learning how to be in a healthy relationship, learning how to be vulnerable again when all I wanted to do was protect myself. Starved for affection while being terrified of it, worried of being hurt, or hurting a new person who truly cared about me and was only trying to help. For a long time, small things- normal things, normal healthy conversations, made me absolutely panic and cry, retreat. I still startle so easily. When I wrote this poem last spring, I was still so nervous in love. It’s been a journey to find stable footing, and I still stumble occasionally.

© Aimee Wood 2022

Will grief and joy arrive on time?

More often lost or late.

With grace, let pass the dear clock’s chime,

Your heart heeds not the date.

---

Heed your tender heart, whatever it is going through. Grief has no timeline, joy has no expiration, and certainly, your heart does not know what day, month, or year it is. There are no order to my poems, as often, my feelings fly at their own pace. Like any injury, the recovery is not linear, there will be good days and worse ones. So yes- my poems seem ‘out of order’, just as my feelings seem out of order. I wonder now if all of my poems are not just one, and yet I am collecting them page by scattered page with no hope of constructing a sensical or chronological book. Some are missing. Some are lost. Many will never see the light of day. But I am glad to share these few with you, and if you are healing too, I hope you allow yourself time and grace.

© Aimee Wood 2022

Read or Listen.

My mistress keeps her careful hands,

On faces and on glass.

She measures memories out in sands,

Marks moments as they pass.

Not long ago, I lay preserved,

Felt dread at every dawn.

I thought that time was frozen too,

And life itself withdrawn.

Yet still she counts, and I had fled-

Hid even from the sun.

I veiled her face, I joined the dead,

Refused to hear her song.

It’s hard to live amongst the dead.

They whisper from the black,

‘To stay alive, don’t look ahead.

But also don’t look back.’

‘This is the best you’ll ever be.’

I’m wrapped in linen, white.

But wait. But wait. This can’t be me.

The sands were always bright.

The slab is heavy on my tomb,

I lift it all the same.

I am not dead! I cry, I kneel,

I don’t know my own name.

I need to meet myself again,

Peel back the sheets anew.

Her hands are spinning, deep within,

So I’ll keep moving too.

Written February 17, 2021

The seven verses above were the first glimpses I had of my muse, Mistress Time. She who frequents my poetry with words of advice, critique, and affirmation to this day. She first visited me soon after I escaped a nearly decade long abusive relationship. Things had gotten so bad, I deadened myself to the world in order to bear it.

But somehow, the ticking of her minute hands soon reached me, and I awoke in time to break free from the tomb. Even entering the sunlight again was blinding, terrifying. I did not even know myself, so long I had been defined by my enslavement to an abusive narcissist.

Now, I have deafened myself to the words of the dead. I keep moving. Over a year later, I have begun to know myself again, grow myself again, be kind and good again. I hope, if you have need of her, the ticking of her gentle hands will reach you too.

I think of all my common measure poems as single verse. The seven verses above, while now assembled into one ‘poem’, I still regard as seven separate poems- they could be read as singles, or reordered. Any might speak, any might not.

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Also published on instagram, @AimeeWoodWrites, February 4, 2022.

Beware- yet trudge that lantern on,

Let moths collect their due,

What light attracts will part come dawn,

But darkness might claim you.

---

What is the cost of optimism? Are you afraid of what your little light might attract in the forest? Would you rather put out your light, to risk losing your way in the dark? I find that hope often lights my way, even as it makes me feel more visible, more vulnerable. But still better than lost. It takes courage to continue on, and while I am not always good at it, while I fear putting myself out there more now than I ever did, any fluttering moths will not last the night.

© Aimee Wood 2022

© Aimee Wood 2022

A poem composed- thus freshly pressed,

Like four leaf clover fold,

Might find and fend the one possessed,

To stave the gloaming’s hold.

---

Sometimes I write down a poem, fold it up, and keep it in my pocket like a good luck charm. A piece of advice or hope, which I can unfold when I need, to remind myself to keep on. And when I do write something new? Such sweet satisfaction to capture a moment in a rhyme, even when the sentiment is heartbreak or loss. Today, the first day, I begin to let my poems fly.

© Aimee Wood 2022