On falling in the river with Margaret Fell

Poem by Dana Littlepage Smith

by Dana Littlepage Smith 17th December 2021

‘So I sat me down in my pew again, and cried bitterly’ Margaret Fell. 1694

When I sat down, the silence
was already rising,
a river of quick fire.
Like a body, flowing,
it called to me. Quaking,
I fell whole, no jot, no tittle
withheld but all of me – falling.
I wept to find that I was ice,
pure ice and that this thing
in me wanted melting…