Unhinged.

Last week it was black shapes
inked on the pale paper.

Idly I opened the book;
eyes scanned the lines,
taking in the angled shapes,
the geometries of lettering.

Then in a silent moment,
a mere shimmering of time,
the shapes became letters:
the letters became words,
pictures formed in my head and reality unhinged.

I sat in another's soul,
gazing out at a different world in a
different place at a
different time.

But today it was the low afternoon light
lapping like a yellow tide against the heaving
shoulders of the Black Mountains.

I was no longer in a car,
negotiating roads
and Welsh bends.
I was in the air,
riding like a kite on the breath of sunlight,
unhinged again
and scarcely safe to drive.

Sometimes I fear crossing a threshold;
entering a world from which
I can't return
..or maybe wouldn't want to.

Should I close the lid?
Fix the latch and
lock the genie in?

Is this losing of ourselves in wonder,
the first step in the giving of ourselves to life?
or the last step in the selling of ourselves to fantasies?

I will not lock the latch.
Nor will I take away the lid.
Instead I'll take a little time to oil the hinges so they move freely...

in both directions.

(c) A Mc N