A man stood by a tree
silhouetted by the setting sun:
A background spun
from the burning webs
of some golden fleece
once prized by legend
but now left to glow
among embers
etching
a silhouette.
poem copyright ©2000 Anne Selden Annab
Walk through ruins
antiquities...
The earth underfoot
includes rocks, rubble, and dust,
pebbles and bits of pottery.
Shards of archaic lives.
I reach down
and my finger's flesh feels
the warm porous clay.
I lift it up.
Long ago this fragment
was a whole
hot from the kiln.
Long ago another woman reached
and her finger's flesh felt
the warm porous clay,
held the earth in her hand
a vessel to fill...
as fluid
reflections
flow.
poem copyright ©2000 Anne Selden Annab
Published National Library Of Poetry, Anthology- 1992
There's an old house in the old city of Amman.
An old house with a carved stone balcony.
I noticed it-
an unexpected flash
a beacon above me
bright with noon light caught
by its limestone exterior.
Up on a sharp hillside,
precipitously wedged
in time and place.
A simple shape, the only clue
to it's archaic heritage
is the carved stone balcony
a balustrade (often copied)
that opens out into carefully constructed stairs.
Steps systematically notched down the steep hillside.
Built out of the rock itself, it seems...
I have no sense of separate foundation,
no sense of where brick might begin.
It is as if eons of rain have washed away stone
in rhythmic patterns, like the snowflake,
to create the arabesque of the balcony.
The house, the balustrade,
and the steps so carefully sculpted
systematically notched down
the steep stony hillside-
A flight methodically
advancing that
suddenly
sharply
erodes into air.
poem copyright ©2000 Anne Selden Annab
