20. Fall on Pamet Marsh

10 x 6.7″ Watercolor

Price $90

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The Floor Beneath Which I Do Not Fall

 

Every day for decades he has swallowed

the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors.

They don’t make me feel happy, he said,

but at least I can get up

and put one foot in front of the other.

 

The Zoloft creates a floor,

beneath which I know I won’t fall. That’s

the best it can do for me.

Walking, I thought about this floor

beneath which one does not fall.

 

I made my way along the bayside beach.

Ice chunks collected next to rushes whipped,

beaten by the early winter winds.

A thick layer of pinestraw padded the walking trails.

 

The wind numbed my cheeks. I stepped

lightly around a wire rectangle covering

beach hay, marked with a  small blue flag:

“Do not disturb—endangered turtle nest!”

 

I walked down empty Main Street,

shops closed, remnants of Christmas wreaths

stuck to the doors. No one inside.

 

Library, toy store, restaurants all shuttered.

Only the market and the library interested

in commerce of one sort or another,

winter vegetables, or books and DVDs.

 

Solar panels of a house across the way

caught sunlight, the grids glinted.

It made me happy to see this.

 

I thought of the floor beneath which

I do not fall, the wood floor of my study,

the mat rolled out so I can sit, notice my breath.

 

I thought of the ground I knelt on yesterday

when I cut down the miscanthus grasses,

tying them with twine, stacking them in the garage.

Solid ground that lets me kneel, sit, tread on it—

the floor below which I do not fall.

 

There’s more: tea in the afternoon, a generous

pour of red wine at dinner, the crossword puzzle

before lights out and deep, dream-filled sleep.

 

All this, the floor below which I do not fall,

that which allows me to awaken, put one foot

in front of the other into the work ahead.

All this holds me up, binds winter body to winter soul.

 

Lynne Viti

 

An earlier version of this poem originally appeared in the anthology Incandescent Minds, Volume 2, Sadie Girl Press, 2016.