Photo: © Bonnie Roub via SUNY Buffalo

Today, I was asked where I saw myself in 10 years.

I can guess.  Maybe settled someplace with more trees. Maybe with real a salary and a set of matching plates. But: where will I be, what will I be doing, will I be satisfied? Will I be happy? What will I have earned?

I came up with something to reply.

But I think the reality is I’ll get from this year to next year to the next nine in the waves of emotional reality that define my every few weeks. I’ll feel challenged and inspired, then discouraged, then bored. And that shifting reality, and ever-altering set of answers will usher me into 10 years from now, and 10 years after that.

This poem by Lorine Niedecker occupies one of those emotion-filled instants. It’s a moment of rapture. But the moment comes at the wrong time, and you have to hold it in, tackle it, and move past it. This poem rocks my world. Read it a few times and it will uncoil for you.

When Ecstasy is Inconvenient

Feign a great calm;
all gay transport soon ends.
Chant: who knows—
flight’s end or flight’s beginning
for the resting gull?

Heart, be still.
Say there is money but it rusted;
say the time of moon is not right for escape.
It’s the color in the lower sky
too broadly suffused,
or the wind in my tie.

Know amazedly how
often one takes his madness
into his own hands
and keeps it.