Poetry by Sharon Whitehill
Laughter involves a “victorious tilting of uncontrol against control.”
Mary Douglas
You were there in my dream
for the first time last night,
its power derived from my laughter
at something so comic
I couldn’t find breath to explain it to you,
though you waited, expectant.
Twice I attempted to speak,
twice grew so tickled all over again
I couldn’t move air to make words.
You stood close, leaning in but bemused
as I tried, and failed, to get through.
What remains of the dream is the bliss
of those spasms of mirth:
how they left me as helpless, in my delight,
as a Laughing Buddha.
What remains with me still
is that visceral tickle
that left me still smiling when I awoke.
As if to pay tribute to laughter itself.
Sharon Whitehill is a retired English professor from West Michigan now living in Port Charlotte, Florida. In addition to poems published in various literary magazines, her publications include two biographies, two memoirs, two poetry chapbooks, and a full collection of poems.
