local_library Abstraction

by Pamela Dionne

Published in Issue No. 283 ~ December, 2020

I’ve got a one-way ticket to Paradox

touring Abstract along the way.

Nothing resembles fact

so much as a large panther

close at hand.

Concrete can be easily understood —

sand and gravel mixed together

with water and powdered Portland cement.

But here there is no hard and fast

that I can touch or be touched by.

There may not be true north.

I’m surrounded by intrinsic

form that represents whatever

it chooses in the moment —

Loyalty?

Perhaps a soupçon of love or hate?

Even gravity is less grave

than it should be, leaving out

all the rotational force required.

When I arrive, at last, I find

that poetry does not exist

without the poem

and no poem can be written

without poetry.

account_box More About

Poet and writer Pamela Moore Dionne’s work has appeared in a number of journals including Shenandoah and Pontoon. She was a Jack Straw writer and received their Artist Support Grant to record a CD of her Sabina Spielrein Ghazal series. Dionne earned a Centrum residency and an Artist Trust Gap Grant. Her visual art has been published in journals and presented in one-woman shows. Other credits include founding and managing the online art & literature journal Literary Salt. Dionne was also the founder of Discovery Bay Games. She received her MFA in Creative writing from Goddard College.