pain is not an ark

by Isabel Chenot

Pain is not an ark.
No one goes in
by two –

we each, alone,
to stem
the breaking firmament

embark
in an acutely
thin

canoe,
taut
over bone –

once named
the Advent.

The mountains
cease to mark.
The oars

beat vertigo.
In solitude, we each learn
how a breaker

seeps through skin,
and how
to drown.

– To swallow,
and inhere
a flood.

Till we can touch
its inwardness, and feel
each other's soul – akin

to God
below this cataract
of blood.

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Isabel Chenot has loved and practiced poetry for as long as she can remember. Some of her poems are collected in The Joseph Tree, available from Wiseblood books.