Poetry Friday & an OLW-related swap

poetry friday logoIt’s Poetry Friday! Julianne at To Read, To Write, To Be is hosting today and celebrating her birthday. Three cheers for Julianne! Hip, hip, hooray!

And now, for the 2016 Summer Poem Swap!

Summer Poem Swap 2016 smaller (2)

How I wish I could I could share with you my joy and excitement when I opened Tabatha’s poem and exquisite gift — it was a magical moment. Because not only had she sent a mirror (which is my one little word for 2016) …

she also wrote a poem that required a mirror to read it.

Mind. Blown.

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Here is the complete (-ly amazing) poem:

The Mirror Maker
By Tabatha Yeatts
for Keri

What the mirror maker
admires most about a mirror
is the way it gives everything away;
arms extended, fingers spread,
cartwheeling back to its visitor.

The  mirror maker begins
with rocks — silica crystals —
basic, but too dazzling
to be humble —
and saturates them with heat

until they drip and pour,
sighing into their liquid selves,
sprawling in the mold
to shape this sparkling community
into a unified sheet of glass.

The mirror maker is not done yet —
it’s crystal clear
that a thin application of metal
is necessary.
Protective, reflective

aluminum coats the glass
like a spring jacket —
just enough to keep
the light from whipping through
like the wind.

What the mirror maker
knows is the key to a fine image
is the time spent smoothing the surface.
The slightest irregularity can result
in distortion — it’s a burden that keeps

the mirror maker polishing after dark,
longing for the mirror’s audience
to be able to see
true.

**

Can this be a metaphor for writing and revising?

**

THANK YOU Tabatha, for this incredible gift and for organizing the swap. Your thoughtfulness humbles me. xoxo

Author: Keri

11 thoughts on “Poetry Friday & an OLW-related swap

  1. Wow! What a lovely poem and a wonderful gift and how clever to write it to be mirror-read! “sighing into their liquid selves”–love that line!

  2. This is amazing. Love the combination of the mirror, the mirror poem, your OLW, and a mirrored poem…lots of thoughtfulness in a little package!
    “cartwheeling back to its visitor” – I think I will always think of mirrors this way now.

  3. And I follow suit tonight with a wow beyond wows! A backward poem reflected in the mirror is such a creative way to engage in poem swapping. Amazing job, Tabatha.

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