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Betsy Sholl: Helium
In that sleepy trance it didn’t seem strange
to see little balloons sprout from my fingertips
then sputter off through air when I shook them.
Not strange that my fingers became tiny
helium tanks filling those mini dirigibles,
till I was lifted, toes not quite touching ground,
then higher, hovering, as if painted by Chagall
adrift among fiddlers, horses with soft eyes,
chickens and brides holding wispy bouquets
atilt over towns, hovels where children sleep
dreaming themselves into flight. Oh, sweet dream,
stay with lovers afloat and doe-eyed donkeys,
don’t let the wind shift to newsclips of burnt
steeples, smoldering hospitals and schools.
To walk through a hissing nest of downed wires,
to be chased to a roof edge by police
with snarling dogs, to carry your false I.D.
to the border where the dictator’s guards
scan the paper, then your trembling hand—
some dreams are better left to the pillow.
Chagall put everyone he loved in his paintings
to keep them safe among chickens and roses,
above jackboots and soldiers at the door
who look at their hands and see only guns.
~~~~
Betsy Sholl was poet laureate of Maine from 2006 to 2011 and has authored nine collections of poetry. Sholl has received several poetry awards, including the 1991 AWP Award, and the 2015 Maine Literary Award, as well as receiving fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Maine Arts Commission. Sholl was one the founding members of Alice James Books, a non-profit publishing house at the University of Maine at Farmington, established in 1973 with the intent of widening women’s access to publishing.
Poem copyright 2024 Betsy Sholl
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“Chagall put everyone he loved in his paintings
to keep them safe”–I wish I could put everyone I love in my poems to keep them safe. Sigh.
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Such a tender wise poem, the way it holds our wishful thinking and our fear all in one frame. It reaches from a sweet dream ( I think of Caliban here) into all of Chagall’s time and personal story, his way of dealing with the same awful tensions, and into the all-too prevalent state violence against ordinary people.
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Well-said. Thank you, Maura.
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Beautiful, moving poem. I posted it on my Facebook page. I love all of Betsy’s work and had the pleasure of workshopping in a peer group with her many years ago. 👏
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Thanks, Deborah!
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I so wish I could do that: “Chagall put everyone he loved in his paintings / to keep them safe among chickens and roses,”
–Rosmarie Epaminondas (Rose Mary Boehm)
http://rosemaryboehm.weebly.com/https://www.rose-mary-boehm-poet.com/ https://www.rose-mary-boehm-poet.com/* https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCR9fygcz_kL4LGuYcvmC8lQ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCR9fygcz_kL4LGuYcvmC8lQ
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I read it over with plans to stop with balloons, but continue once more to news clips.
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Memories of museums and Israel. But, there is always a but, jackboots and dreams blending horror of then and now.
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Thank you, Betsy Scholl!
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Wonderfully acute, dear Betsy! Thanks so much!
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oh, that our sweet dreams could keep our loves aloft above the fascist jackboots and brimstone…Chagall’s alchemical powers of beauty, Sholl’s demonstration of the helium powers residing, at times, in the fingertips of the human dilemma, wake viewers and readers up, but leave us to seek the answers to the riddles their words and images pose. A great poem.
For those who don’t know Chagall and his work, now is a good time to Google him.
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well-said, Jim. Thank you!
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I love this whole stream, and the segue into swans as I read through Betsy on into Edna St Vincent Millay 4 or 5 poems later, and I’m certain along that way I’ve eaten from the tree of knowledge of good and evil and now something insists I must leave this garden, and stay on the path on my way out.
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Thanks for being a loyal reader and correspondent, Sean. We need your inspired energy!
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A knockout poem.
Lovely poem.
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Isn’t it, though?
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