Michael Boissevain
Illumination
“I am not empty, I am open.”
–Vermeer, Tomas Transtromer
After the stroke,
after the aphasia,
after the work of healing others,
with one hand Tomas plays Haydn,
moving deeper into pure music,
where sound becomes immaterial
and merges with the cold northern light
streaming over his shoulder
from the window to his left, splaying across his piano,
illuminating an expression that prevails over paralysis.
In the spaces between notes I hear
his dreams transformed into poems,
and I follow his words, tracks on a page,
a trail across a ghost glacier
that existed only in my childhood.
Tomas invokes a church in darkness,
headlights of oncoming traffic,
a white field in winter,
a single grain of sand that binds movement,
wind that drives me in bewildering directions.
After all, in silence
he makes the world whole again.
Michael Boissevain is a clinical psychologist by training and a poet by avocation, living in Victoria BC on the unceded territory of the Lekwungen speaking peoples. In 1974, he attended University of Victoria’s Creative Writing program with Robin Skelton, Dirk Wynand, and John Montague. His chapbook The Long Table was shortlisted for the 2024 Raven Press Chapbook Contest. His poetry has appeared in a number journals in North America and Europe. In his writing, Michael gravitates towards themes of family, the land, the environment, and the politics of the complicated world that we all inhabit.