She fell first
in her own story
and then into mine
nine stories down
onto a net
that caught her enough to save her
Nothing broke
but the bones were stunned
inside
skin
and she could not walk for months after
clutching chairs
walls the edges of tables
All these months en Sevilla
she had been that woman
en la clase de baile
who could not put her foot
down
the back heel
the tacón
would not push its way
down into sound
In flamenco
that might even be a crime
but I looked away
even the teacher looked away
because there was something there
too tender to touch
No one said a word
and I made sounds loud enough
ta ka ta ta ka ta
planta tacón
that’s why I was there
to be seen as the sound
and take the compás to heart
And then one evening
at that tapas place
near the garage
she told me the story
in a plaza loud
with Castellano
and recent rain
The accident had happened years ago
but still…
I listened
saying nothing
humbled by the story
in that heel
ashamed at my own need
to be seen
and then
kissed her on both cheeks
as you do en España
and
the next morning
I woke in a daze
seeing the moment
that she says
she cannot
remember:
standing in scaffolding
clutching a piece of paper
about the status of the construction
It was her job
she checked a box
scrawled a note
and then
the
step
into
air
flight
gravity
destiny
All morning
I sat in a cafe
watching an old wall
and a leafless tree
that might have been azahar
but now there were no orange blossoms
was it dying or dormant?
dark brown bark
jagged ends
and round hew marks
where someone had cut
the other branches down
I felt the longing
that makes me
A current of green
raced up the body
and broke all the schedules
for the day
all the programmed plans
gone
All I could do was sit and
feel
the images
of that step
gathering
under my skin
racing up my hand
hungry for paper
and when I took the pen into my hand
the words leapt into the tree
the branches grew leaves
a flock of crows alit on them
the church bells sounded
a bus lumbered past
two children in raincoats
crossed the street
with their mother
looking both ways
-all the business of life in a
once walled city-
I wrote the poem
put the pen down
took a breath
and marveled at courage
that lives in plain sight
hidden in a heel
that will not fall down
and in that unmade
sound
is the whole story
of
sonder
someone falling
in her own story first
and then into yours
Noun
sonder (uncountable)
(neologism) The profound feeling of realizing that everyone, including strangers passing in the street, has a life as complex as one’s own, which they are constantly living despite one’s personal lack of awareness of it.
Etymology
Coined by John Koenig in 2012, whose project, The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, aims to come up with new words for emotions that currently lack words.[1][2] Inspired by German sonder- (“special”) and French sonder (“to probe”).
Source: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/sonder
