Ascent

Like a small plane

lofting and tip-winging its way

toward clouds

you sway in our thoughts

forward and back

as you breathe with the tock

of mechanical breath; and I wonder

if your dreaming is an effortless glide—

if, in your slumber, you can sense some elemental code—

if, balanced on the far rim of home,

you are joining with the Primordial host;

and, as you breeze above us,

solo,

over green field and hamlet,

if, finally, you can see the country

of deep creases you leave within us.

Reprint: AJN, American Journal of Nursing. 119(12):33, December 2019.

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SJ Schlossman is a poet who works as a marketing director for a corporate entertainment company in Orlando, FL. She is an established member of the Orlando writing community and has interviewed local and international poets for the National Public Radio affiliate WMFE-FM broadcast, The Arts Connection. Her work has appeared in The Hong Kong Review and The Louisiana Review.

“Ascent” © 2019 by Sara Schlossman. Contact author: poeticlogic@earthlink.net.

Art of Nursing is coordinated by Amy M. Collins, managing editor: amy.collins@wolterskluwer.com.