Whitmans of the Wild

Allegra Silberstein

HOME THOUGHTS IN NOVEMBER
—Allegra Silberstein, Davis

In memory's mirror I look home
to the barn on my brother's small farm
in Wisconsin where we grew up.
The cows stand patiently waiting to be milked.
My brother and his wife know each one
by her given name.

When barn swallows leave,
their nesting days done
and the ducks gone from the pond,
cold, hard days come, as now they have.
Breath of the cows makes a mist
as they mumble summer-sunned hay.

No matter if the dark wind howls around
corners, within these walls, all are safe,
warm with shared body heat.
The cows first kneel, then lie down to rest.
The crumbled years shine like lime
spread upon the clean driveway.

____________________

Thanks, Allegra! Allegra Silberstein is a retired teacher who now has more time for writing. She also dances, sings, and plays the recorder when she can find a few spare moments. Her poems have been published in Poetry Depth Quarterly, Blue Unicorn, Rattlesnake Review, Poetry Now, Poetry of the New West, California Quarterly, and other journals. Publication in anthologies includes: The Sacramento Anthology: One Hundred Poems; Gatherings; A Woman's Place, and Where Do I Walk. Her first chapbook, Acceptance, was published in 1999, and her second, In The Folds, was published by Rattlesnake Press in 2005. Look for more poems from Allegra in Rattlesnake Review #16, due out in mid-December, and on rattlesnakepress.com (Rattlechappers' page).

Allegra also co-hosts The Other Voice, a monthly reading series at the Unitarian Church in Davis. December 7 will feature Rattlechappers Danyen Powell and Katy Brown; more about that next week.

Speaking of Katy, do you have your copy of her KatyKalendar yet (A Poet's Book of Days)? Pick one up from rattlesnakepress.com (HandyStuff page) or The Book Collector, or directly from me at P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726. Or come to Katy and Danyen's reading Dec. 7 in Davis!

If you'd rather have the daily kind of calendar, go to http://www.poets.org/store.php/mt/121/prmID/294/ for some cool poetry stuff, Christmas gifts for yourself or for others.


Calendar additions for this week:

•••Thurs. (11/29), 7:30 PM: Benefit for the Yuba Watershed Institute: “Peaks, Fires & Spirits of Love and Loss,” an evening with Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Gary Snyder. Center for the Arts, 314 W. Main St., Grass Valley. Admission is $35 including dessert buffet and no-host bar. Tickets: 530-271-7000 or thecenterforthearts.org/. Info: Tania Carlone, Yuba Watershed Institute, 530-265-4459 or taniacarlone@sbcglobal.net/.

•••Friday (11/30), 8:30 PM: Open mic (3 poems/songs each) plus features: Vocalist Maryann Mason and poets Terry Moore, Taylor Williams, Khiry Malik Moore and more. Isis Bazaar, 122 - I Street (In Old Sacramento, as soon as you enter on the right). $5.00 admission. Info: 916-208-POET or www.mybmsf.com/terrymoore/. (Before the reading, drop by Underground Books from 6-8 PM for the Terry Moore “Validated” book signing and social event. Address on the website above.)

Call for Submissions: Be Part of the Premiere Issue

Editor Lisa Espenmiller of Oakland seeks meticulously crafted poems and short prose pieces for her new journal, Singing With The Whale, which intends to use a unique publishing concept that is based more on the idea of being a gallery or a book without ending, rather than specific issues with a beginning and an end. The site seeks in its design format to express a feeling of clean lines and Zen simplicity, enabling the visual focus to be on the words themselves. Check it out at www.singingwiththewhale.com or write to editor@singingwiththewhale.com/.

_____________________

SAMAPATTI OF A HIDDEN LAKE
—Allegra Silberstein

A storm had muddied the small clear lake.
Release came as molecules of water
let go the stirrings spooned by wind
and run-off: a healing time of wait—
the wind wound down
to a gentle breeze like an armistice.

As I walked down this wild-life road
I heard the song of a red-winged blackbird.
The sun well-past mid-day brought slant light.
The lake mirrored overhanging trees,
tule-reeds, elderberry, cattails
and Queen Ann's lace with perfect clarity.

Though storms may come with manifest power—
stronger the stillness that shaped this hour.


Samapatti: a Sanskrit term for a state of mental absorption
that allows a clear vision of the world made possible
when the turnings of the mind have been stopped.

____________________

CONSIDERATIONS OF THE FORMAL
—Allegra Silberstein

I heard the professor of poetics
proclaim the issues of iambic and
pentameter, of villanelle, sestina
and pantoum, of free verse, blank, and lyric,
of sonnets: Petrarchan and Shakespearean;
I heard his fine intellect—then
considered my singular ignorance.

Outside the vaulted window where I sat,
a brown bird singing distracted me.
I could not name this bird,
could not spell out the notes
of his unlettered lyric verse...
a Whitman of the wild, without a pen,
with his syrinx brought me poems.

_____________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their POETRY, PHOTOS and ART, as well as announcements of Northern California poetry events, to kathykieth@hotmail.com (or snail ‘em to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726) for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets. Previously-published poems are okay for Medusa’s Kitchen, as long as you own the rights. (Please cite publication.) Medusa cannot vouch for the moral fiber of other publications, contests, etc. that she lists, however, so submit to them at your own risk. For more info about the Snake Empire, including guidelines for submitting to or obtaining our publications, click on the link to the right of this column: Rattlesnake Press (rattlesnakepress.com).

SnakeWatch: Up-to-the-minute Snake news:

Rattlesnake Review: The latest issue of Rattlesnake Review (#15) is available for free at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sacramento, or send $2 to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726. Issue #16 will be out in mid-December; its deadline of Nov. 15 has passed. Next deadline (for Issue #17, due out in mid-March) is February 15. (Sooner than you think!)

New in November: On November 14, Rattlesnake Press released Among Neighbors, a rattlechap from Taylor Graham; Home is Where You Hang Your Wings, a free littlesnake broadside from frank andrick; and A Poet's Book of Days, a perpetual calendar featuring the poetry and photography of Katy Brown. These are now available at The Book Collector, from kathykieth@hotmail.com, or on rattlesnakepress.com/, as is October's Conversations, Vol. One of B.L. Kennedy's Rattlesnake Interview Series.

Coming December 12: The Snake is proud to announce the release of Metamorphic Intervals From The Insanity Of Time, a SnakeRings SpiralChap from Patricia D'Alessandro; Notes From An Ivory Tower, a littlesnake broadside from Ann Wehrman; and a brand new issue of Rattlesnake Review (#16). Come celebrate all of these on Wednesday, December 12, 7:30 PM at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sacramento. Refreshments and a read-around will follow; bring your own poems or somebody else's.