Falling Free

Posted on 2021-04-12 by Bartholomew Barker

Instead of writing to someone else’s prompt, I wrote today’s poem for Yuri’s Night, the sixtieth anniversary of the first time we put a human in orbit.

Falling Free

Mission Control didn’t know
how he’d react without weight
so they locked the controls
just in case
but Yuri delighted
in feeling floating falling
first to see the firmament
from the outside

He jumped from his little ball
ten minutes before it landed
drifting to earth
under a parachute
breathing that voluptuous air
of Russian spring
landing on his feet
weighted once more

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About Bartholomew Barker

Bartholomew Barker is an organizer of Living Poetry, a collection of poets in the Triangle region of North Carolina where he has hosted a monthly feedback workshop for more than decade. His first poetry collection, Wednesday Night Regular, written in and about strip clubs, was published in 2013. His second, Milkshakes and Chilidogs, a chapbook of food inspired poetry was served in 2017. He was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2021. Born and raised in Ohio, studied in Chicago, he worked in Connecticut for nearly twenty years before moving to Hillsborough where he lives and writes poetry.
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4 Responses to Falling Free

  1. JeanMarie's avatar JeanMarie says:
    2021-04-12 at 19:41

    This is great. I like the F alliteration. I went with the Ss. Great minds and all that. :)

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  2. Lisa Tomey-Zonneveld's avatar Lisa Tomey says:
    2021-04-15 at 09:53

    I felt like the one falling…a dream of mine is to be freely floating with no pain. Hmm I think there is a poem in that.

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