Zeitgeber
The rattle of the rain
Sets in, mutters
With enough of a roar
That the foreboding
Drains, suddenly
Unmoored, confirm
The rough wisdom
Of an ancient chord,
Conjured from the storm’s
Dark hum
As curtains leak
A hint of grey,
Wrung from something
That fills me now
With its sudden spring.
After all that, still,
I’ve slept soundly at last,
And from the windowsill
A hint of budding day unfurls
And streams through me
With the rhythms of the world.
June 10th, 2022
Kaiholu
April 1st, 2024
Kaiholu
Explanation
Jürgen Aschoff found that certain external clues synchronize our body’s internal clock to the daily rhythms around us. He called these stimuli “zeitgebers.” They can be sun, temperature, meals, a storm. They restore our sense of belonging.
When the time is out of joint, and our gears mesh clumsily with the external world, when we have jet lag, are living with the midnight sun, or when we have lost a love, nothing feels right. But when light or love is restored, our circadian clocks are reset. We are given back the time.
This comes from the same root as my poem “Earth Giver.”