The Next Door [countdown: 6]

(from the archives, taken in May 2009)


Delivered out of raw continual pain,
smell of darkness, groans of those others
to whom she was chained --

unchained, and led
past the sleepers,
door after door silently opening --
out!
And along a long street's
majestic emptiness under the moon:

one hand on the angel's shoulder, one
feeling the air before her,
eyes open but fixed...

And not till she saw the angel had left her,
alone and free to resume
the ecstatic, dangerous, wearisome roads of
what she had still to do,
not till then did she recognize
this was no dream. More frightening
than arrest, than being chained to her warders:
she could hear her own footsteps suddenly.
Had the angel's feet
made any sound? She could not recall.
No one had missed her, no one was in pursuit.
She herself must be
the key, now, to the next door,
the next terrors of freedom and joy.

~ Denise Levertov ~