From Ways of Going
for Steve
Will it be like paragliding&;
gossamer takeoff, seedlike drifting down
into a sunlit, unexpected grove?
Or ski-jumping&;headlong soaring,
ski-tips piercing clouds,
crystal revelations astonishing my goggles?
. . . . Skittery flicker of a glare-weary lizard
startled into the sheltering wings of a leaf,
rusting freighter with a brimming hold
shimmering onto a crimson edge. . . .
Sad rower pushed from shore,
I'll disappear like circles summoned
by an oar's dip.
However I burn through to the next atmosphere,
let your dear face be the last thing I see.
 
 
Whether writing poems about North American life and landscape; or love poems; or elegies for family and friends; or poems on serious, debilitating illness and the transformations it can effect&;Elise Partridge offers in Chameleon Hours words forged by suffering and courage. Full of wit and empathy, Partridge&;s poems draw inspiration from sources as whimsical as tortoises and pontoons, as poignant as a homeless woman taking shelter inside a post office on a winter night, and as deeply personal as her own cancer diagnosis at a young age. Chameleon Hours is a book about the rewards of being reminded of one&;s own mortality and the lyric expression of life in all its intensity.
 
Elise Partridge is a teacher and editor.  She is the author of Fielder&;s Choice.