Memento, a Poem

Memento, a Poem

by | Aug 5, 2023 | Artist, History, Poetry, Writing

This poem, Memento, was in response to a prompt from writer Margaret Sefton, on the Mastodon social media platform. The prompt was for anything in 50 words, using the term “gossamer.”

gossamer • noun • gos· sa· mer ˈgä-sə-mər 

  1. a film of cobwebs floating in air in calm clear weather
  2. something light, delicate, or insubstantial

adjective : extremely light, delicate, or tenuous

More interesting background for gossamer at Merriam-Webster.

Here’s my poem, followed by the backstory and inspiration:

Memento

She lay headfirst on the table before me,
A slight and youthful beauty,
Gossamer hair fittingly pale blonde,
To match her translucent skin.
In 15 years, I never saw another
With hair so impossibly fine,
Floating into my oiled hands,
Unbidden, undesired, and yet …
A cherished memory; a muse.

Painting by Friedrich Heyser from around 1900, of William Shakespeare’s tragic character Ophelia, from his play Hamlet. She is depicted as a young woman in a white gown, floating among water lilies in a lake, with her arm outstretched.
Painting by Friedrich Heyser, ca. 1900, of Ophelia, William Shakespeare’s tragic character from his play Hamlet.

Backstory

For 15 years, I was in (mostly) private practice as a medical massage therapist. Some clients came simply for relaxation, many others for my specialty in pain management. However, my super-rare, very special specialty was in vocal massage therapy. As such, I saw clients with vocal pathologies, resulting from birth disorders, trauma, surgeries, brain tumors, cancers, radiation treatment, and other medical conditions. Further, I worked with professional singers, and folks with speech-heavy professions, like trial lawyers. I did a lot of work around the head and neck.

Now, being a particularly conscientious massage therapist, I was always hyper-aware of getting oil in people’s hair (assuming I was using oil, which wasn’t always the case). This was, unsurprisingly, due to my own experiences. When I went for massages, I’d repeatedly had my freshly-washed hair oiled up by other therapists. Many of them, in fact. I hated it, and could never understand how so many could be so thoughtless. Some of them weren’t just careless around my neck, but they’d purposefully run their heavily oiled fingers through my hair. Subsequently, instead of allowing the oils to condition my body until the evening, I’d have to shower immediately upon returning home, simply because my hair was now an unsightly mess.

Inspiration for the Memento Poem

Fairly early in my career, I practiced medical massage in Georgetown, in Washington, D.C. One day a client came in, and she had the finest, most wispy hair that I have seen, before or since. It wasn’t sparse, just ultra fine and soft. I didn’t know individual strands of hair could actually be so thin. Her hair was shoulder-length, and I wondered if she could grow it any longer, before it succumbed to stress and broke.

Naturally, when this client lay down on my massage table, I was acutely aware of just how fine her hair was. In fact, gossamer was exactly the word that then came to mind. And, indeed, her hair practically floated into my oiled hands, despite my careful attempts to avoid such a fate. Oh, well. I apologized to her, and she said it didn’t matter.

But apparently it did, at least in my memory. Her hair was so remarkable, I’ve never forgotten it. She reminded me of so many beautiful, pensive, even sad paintings of lovely young women, like the one of Ophelia I include above.

And now she’s inspired my little poem, Memento. It’s short, but I hope you enjoyed it!

Thanks for your time and attention, both are valuable. 🙏🏻
I invite you to view my photographs and paintings, and to learn more about me.

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©Marlene Breitenstein. I welcome your inquiries about purchasing, licensing, or republishing my work. I take my intellectual property seriously. This post and its contents, unless otherwise noted, is owned by Marlene Breitenstein. It is not to be reproduced, copied, or published in derivative, without permission from the artist.

Endings: first a photograph, then a poem

Endings: first a photograph, then a poem

by | May 10, 2023 | Art, Photography, Poetry, Writing

I suppose it’s rather odd to begin a new blog with a post title signifying something ending, yet here we are. I wrote the following poem specifically for this photograph, which I took last November 18th. It was a magic hour of rich and sublime colors, mixed with layered, quickly morphing cloud formations. The photography outing resulted in more than a dozen strikingly distinct images worth sharing. (Find some on my Photography page.)

Despite the rosy scene, this poem unexpectedly turned dark. The first stanza poured out of me, setting the tone and direction. (Each stanza is touched by its own ending.)

Endings

Our life-giving sun king has slipped away at last,
tinting clouds in pink-lavender-peach as a
final offering to his cold, moon-faced queen,
beckoning her to come—quickly!—but
she is too late, too late for his demise.

Beneath the fading vapors, forest-clad mountains
wear thick autumn coats, yet shiver,
bereft, in the chilled evening breeze.

On gentler hills, the vineyards—arms intertwined in
helpless defense—have been stripped of their
grapes, those green and purple teardrops,
once kissed and sweetened by the very sun
for whom they now cannot weep.

And in the lowest field, heads bowed in
silent grief, the sunflowers gather in mourning,
blackened on their withering stalks.

Undoubtedly, this will not be the last photograph + poem combination I publish here. I am inspired to write by the beauty of Palatinate, Germany (where I live), with its rolling vineyards and fairy tale forests. Combining these arts is soul-enriching. Does the coupling of image and words also float your boat?

Thanks for your time and attention, both are valuable. 🙏🏻
I invite you to view my photographs and paintings, and to learn more about me.

If you liked this post, you have options:

©Marlene Breitenstein. I welcome your inquiries about purchasing, licensing, or republishing my work. I take my intellectual property seriously. This post and its contents, unless otherwise noted, is owned by Marlene Breitenstein. It is not to be reproduced, copied, or published in derivative, without permission from the artist.