National Poetry Month: One

Once again it is national poetry month, so I'll use this as a means to get back into blogging by posting poetry (my own and favorites by others).

I wrote 'One' nearly fourteen years ago, and it's one of those poems that came as inspiration. I was living in the city and one morning as Summer was waning, I was walking to the bus thinking about ways in which my life was changing. Words and phrases started bubbling up in my head and then I saw a leaf detach from a branch and drop down, carried on a light breeze. It caught the sun at times but slowly made it's way out of sight.

Something clicked in my head. That leaf was me. I got on the bus and wrote this poem all at once. No edits, no drafts. It just came.

when a leaf
feels the wind,
it clings
to the branch
like a child
to a mother's hand.
it
slowly
lets go
and
when it's free,
it flies
and is
the most
beautiful
when it is

alone

for the first time

uncertain of

where

it will

go.