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Attempts at Meditation

It’s not easy for this volcanic body
to sit still, be still, float on silence,

the erupting mind mining the next
thing, eyes darting back and forth

for prey, not prayers, for next actions,
more things, not the inner room.

Stillness feels useless, near death,
a warning, a threat of a whipping

with a switch or a belt, that white-ash
pain of shame. The unmet craving of

adrenalin, dopamine, the non-holy gods,
feeds the sensation of being buried alive

in quiet. The heart burns off its own love
like a ticking, ticking, ticking bomb.

—
Sheri Flowers Anderson writes and lives in San Antonio, Texas. Her work has appeared in Sixfold Poetry, Pensive Journal, Atlanta Review, and other publications. She’s the author of a poetry collection titled House and Home (Broadside Lotus Press) and the 2023 winner of the Naomi Long Madgett Poetry Prize.

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