Friday, February 28, 2014

Drawing a Heart

1.

Drawing a heart is particularly difficult, because
you must pull the left hand curve into a right,
and pull the right hand curve into a left.

All very well to reach for anatomy;
try to finesse the difficulty with atria,
ventricles, chambers, anything bloody

and (therefore) supposedly real:
but the fact is that life and we are
stylized, and it is a matter of anxious care

that the left should pull to right and right to left
and arrive at a symmetric downward thorn.


 2.

Just so, the past must be pulled forward
and the sweep of the future pulled back,
while my massage therapist's eye

considers the set of the shoulders,
(the habitual purse of the orbicularis oris,
the buccinator's telltale grief.)

Friendship must be drawn to love
and love to friendship, each curve
inverted at the same time and in the same degree;

left should pull to right and right to left
and arrive at a symmetric downward thorn.

5 comments:

Zhoen said...

I could draw a heart in school, and the other kids would have me draw the outline for them. They weren't perfect hearts, but I'd practiced, and could make them look ok. A bit asymmetrical, but close enough.

I wasn't that good at drawing, I don't know why I had this small talent, but there it was.

Dale said...

It's a grand talent! I can't do it.

Zhoen said...

Fold the paper in half, draw one side, then apply scissors.

Anonymous said...

Such a kind poem.

When I've tried to make hearts with scissors, the two sides kind of resent each other when I pull them apart.

Anonymous said...

Gorgeous.