Balwit & Nohe – May 2018

Tim Nohe and Devon Balwit traded art and words. Tim shared this image, entitled “Subtle Oscillations,” with Devon:

In response, Devon wrote this poem:

Yes

Teased out by trial and error, by tinkering,
giddiness flares in me, a flame.

Each minute alteration leaves me other
than I was, no longer my mother’s child

but more. A divine digit, I circumnavigate
the compass rose, a light-pulse

following the blocking of some master
choreographer. No Platonic solid, no

Metatron cube, but a Rodin coil, I torque
mutinous Seraphim. I summon winds

dizzy and dizzying as those kicked up
by the skirts of a dervish. Elemental,

I throw over all who knew me, preferring
new companions, void and vortex.

What is flesh to me now, what two
dimensions or three, when I can have every,

each choice a node, each node adding
suppleness to the flung net? The more

I embrace nothingness, the more I enfold.
A filament, I glow as long as I remain

untouched. Wedding band of the all-
in-all, I say yes. I let myself go.

* * * * *

Devon shared this poem with Tim:

On the Bus

The baby dizzies with delight, chortling
and flapping at the stranger’s
lapdog, rocking and rocking, as if
to lever her mother closer to its whiskers.

Not given to kitsch, I give myself
without hesitation to the bright wishing
wells of her cheek and eye, plunging
mind deep as if scooping coin.

Each time the sign warns Stop
Requested, I check the mother’s hands
to be sure they haven’t budged.
Stay with me, baby, to the end,

like a sister of mercy on a dark
ward. Nothing evil can come
to pass while your gums glisten
and your topknot bobbles.

In response, Tim created this datamoshed video still entitled “OTB”: