free-verse postures, vinyasa poesy

while on my mat today in tadasana an impish poem
flits into my practice, scampers around me,
twirls my yoga strap the way a rhythmic gymnast might,
navigates the balance beam of my bolster,
spins distracting cartwheels in my mind when, whoa,
instructor bo—thank you!—invites us all
to breathe, no need to see anything as wall.

—dotty seiter

=====

=====

Notes about poem and art:
• I’ve become fascinated by the way poems become poems, and I’ve revisited the demi-sonnet form to give shape here to “free-verse postures” which is a poem about a different poem that was trying its darnedest to get me off my yoga mat to go write it! I love that the demi-sonnet has more freedoms and spaciousness than, say, a tanka but is still tight enough to challenge me to stay within its confines and also has the optional invitation to end with a rhyming or slant-rhyming couplet.
• Cavorting was itself a bit of a pesky insistent idea wanting expression. I kept resisting, perceiving it in my mind to be somehow “too simple,” or “too easy,” or … I really don’t know what, when what my heart knew was I wanted to paint tiny, bright, and playful. Thank you, my heart! So grounding and spirit-lifting to paint this piece.