Like a Leather Mini-Skirt

SHE PUBLISHES HERSELF

with shameless effrontery: flaunts
her naked scribblings

like a leather mini-skirt: long red
nails: publishes raw words about

her ex and her step-kids and
that aging hippie next door: favorite

addictions and how her mother
wouldn’t let her shave her legs: pays

for the paper and cranks up the copy
machine to show herself off without

the benefit of cheesecloth: no censor
here to blue-pencil her meanderings,

her random ricochets—reckless
flashing of those sharp red nails…

—Kathy Kieth, Fair Oaks

_________________________

You might as well change the dial if you don't want to hear about Kathy Kieth today. Since nobody else will send me poems...

Today would've been my dad's 95th birthday. Our relationship was mixed, but we did spend one good night together in the hospital shortly before he died, him stoned on legal pharmaceuticals, me stoned on lack of sleep:


WAITING FOR DAYLIGHT
—Kathy Kieth

Addled by drugs, my father is
a handful for the night
nurse, but settles when I sit
with him. Still, he fiddles

with tubes, tries to re-arrange
the imposements of a hospital
bed. Hoping to distract, I trigger
old memories: it works; nurses

withdraw into their own shadowy
midnight of charts and carts, slick
dark hallways... He points out
a big black dog on the foot

of his bed: visitor I'm not ready
to see: hound that waits with us
for tomorrow, for the decisive
scalpel of daylight, for bright sun

to flood this room with his new
family. Meanwhile we hold
hands, talk about our old life,
about the three of us before

my mother died. And the black dog
listens, waits with us: now and then
lifting its huge, dark head...

(Previously appeared in Poetry Now, October 2003)

_______________________

As I mentioned before, Medusa and I have been dealing with burn-out issues. Yesterday was therapeutic: saw several poetry friends, who soothed the beast with the panache that poets sometimes have, whether they know it or not. Plus the Snake won his wily self an award from Sacramento News and Review! Last year those folks were kind enough to crown the wee Snakelets "Best Poetry for Children"; this year we got "Best Small Poetry Press". Just because I'm so indulgent today, I shall reprint the description here:

"Just as there is no shortage of fine poets in the area, there's no shortage of small poetry presses doing quality work; among them are Penn Valley's R.L. Crow and Stockton's Poet's Corner Press. But first among equals is the incredibly, impossibly active Rattlesnake Press, headquartered in Fair Oaks. In addition to publishing Rattlesnake Review, a literary journal; Snakelets, one of the nation's few poetry journals for children; and Vyper, a literary journal aimed at teens, Wrangler-in- Chief Kathy Kieth and her staff manage to turn out a couple of well-made poetry chapbooks every month. Although we're not really fans of the "spiralchap" format (using spiral binding and full-sized pages), the smaller books are lovingly designed, artisanal books worthy of becoming keepsakes. They showcase some outstanding local poets. Watch for chapbook-release parties and readings on the second Wednesday of the month at The Book Collector, 1008 24th Street, Sac."

This is most excellently cool; thanks, SN&R!!!

Back to my friends:


MURMURS IN THE KITCHEN
(for Frannie-Alice)

Yellowing windowshades muzzle
a hot summer day: muffle
brassy July sun that slants against
peeling linoleum. Two grey heads

bend over knife nicks in a wooden
table: murmur the worn-out secrets
of old women as stiff fingers curve
around chipped cups: grasp at

the soft flesh of each other's words:
embrace the slim gossip of this
gathering twilight... Yellowing
shades fold the room in liquid

amber: wash faded tile bronze, as
the murmurs scatter across crowded
drainboards: bounce with a ping off
the cooling stove: roll along base-

boards and under dented pans: finally
come to rest: curl up in the china
cabinet alongside those few choice
pieces left behind by somebody's

grandmother, somebody's mother,
somebody's aunt...

_______________________

Deadline for Snakelets has been extended to OCTOBER 10; please see what you can do to get more kid-poems to me by then (ages 0-12).

I see Molly Fisk still has openings in her Internet October Boot Camp. People speak highly of this chance to write like a dervish for a short period of time: "The October Boot Camp is coming up, October 16-21, in case your fall schedule has room for a harvest of new poems. Space is limited, so let me know as soon as you can. (http://www.poetrybootcamp.com)"

SnakePal Irene Lipshin of the notorious Red Fox Poets in Placerville sends me this link to Garrison Keillor's Writers Almanac website, which posts poetry on a daily basis: writersalmanac.publicradio.org.

One final whipped-cream/cherry-on-top indulgence for kk: I have two chaps available at The Book Collector, and a new (free) broadside: Way Too Much Sky.

Here's me in burnout:


WOLF-CHILD
—Kathy Kieth

She has two tiny fangs embedded
in her jowls: sharp little needles

that sink into outstretched flesh, leave
bloody tracks on unsuspecting

hands. Raised by her wolf-mother,
she can't trust bare hands: snarls

against the perversity of humans: their
naked reachings and their strange pink

hairless bodies. So, one by one, she
carefully unwinds her days, dressed

in her apron, pacing her suburban
house: listens to the aching in her jaws

as the wind howls someplace faraway,
over the snowy mountains...

___________________________


—Medusa (and thanks, Colette Jonopulos, for the kind words on the Tiger's Eye blog August 27—click on link to the right to see it)

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.