Lighthearted, sort of

Well, I may not have written a lot of jubilant poetry, but I did find one dating from a brief span of time when I was young, naive and deliriously happy somewhere in England.

Landscape

We climbed the spiraling
stairs to the castle tower.
There was a landscape I could not see;
it slid past my eyes like a scarf.
I would not look up
because it was like walking into the sky,
as if I had no body.
I would not look down
because it was like wanting to jump.

She told me
when she was a little girl
in search of forbidden sweets
she climbed the pantry shelves like a ladder
and tipped a jar of honey over her head.

She has fallen
into a rumpled sleep
on the cathedral grounds.
The heat is stunning;
blue bottles and bumble bees
stumble above her head.
She is wearing a dress
that dips in the back.
The sun stings there, along her shoulders
and behind her knees.

The cathedral bells are ringing
as if they had always been ringing.