Photo by Frank Graham, Sacramento
MOJAVE SUNSET
—Virginia Hamilton Adair
When the afternoon wind arrives from the sea
the blue tent of the sky flaps open in welcome,
the sands dance in long cotillions
and the jackrabbit leaps from its hiding place
under the flowering creosote.
At the eastern end of Wonder Valley
the long pale hill of sand turns to rose
in the final rays of the sun.
To the north, the Sheephole Mountain
begins its preparations for the cool evening,
long purple robes trailing down the arroyos.
As the sky dims into dusk, the vast garden of the valley
blooms with stars, and our hands with gratitude
touch the quiet stones, the cooling sand.
—Virginia Hamilton Adair
When the afternoon wind arrives from the sea
the blue tent of the sky flaps open in welcome,
the sands dance in long cotillions
and the jackrabbit leaps from its hiding place
under the flowering creosote.
At the eastern end of Wonder Valley
the long pale hill of sand turns to rose
in the final rays of the sun.
To the north, the Sheephole Mountain
begins its preparations for the cool evening,
long purple robes trailing down the arroyos.
As the sky dims into dusk, the vast garden of the valley
blooms with stars, and our hands with gratitude
touch the quiet stones, the cooling sand.
___________________
LOVING STONES
—Virginia Hamilton Adair
In the Mojave, east of here,
the wind talks to the stones
and they whisper back.
We say "Stone cold," "stone dead,"
yet the sun embraces them,
the moon finds them beautiful,
clouds drape their shadows over these stones.
Every wind-honed rock tells the story of the earth,
its hot cores, its cold seas,
recites the sagas of riverbeds
where they once lay or tumbled.
Learning patience. Achieving grace.
__________________
VACATION LOOKOUT, MOUNTAINS AROUND
—Tom Goff, Carmichael
Rip-tooth of the sky’s acetylene, said Hart Crane,
who sought some height to climb
even when stealing to fling himself erased
in the ship’s phosphorescent slipcase.
Made it, Ma! Top of the World! yells Cagney,
pouring bullets into the gasoline storage tank
he’s ascended in “White Heat,” rip-tooth
of the gangster movie. What’s all this
riptooth and acetylene, anyhow, to these jags
of snow-pocked mountain holdfast, Sierra
Bavaria, where the eagles that dare are only
the winds’ bodiless traverses, bluster and gust?
Where the frame-frail vacation lookout, haggard
with clarity, broods over the day-late horizon
spectrum, complete in its “Richard
Of York Gave Battle In Vain” array?
The longboard storm shutters could be freed,
struts dismantled, and battened, but none of that now.
So why the terror for us inside? Is it the deck floor
canting down? Then again, we’ve thought we might
tumble breakneck from our Elizabethan balcony.
We witness “The Tempest” at Ashland, storm-play
in a play of real storm, Miranda clad in her
island-drenched slip, Prospero bellowing for Ariel
to the mechanized lightning, the actual thunder,
supernatural and the terrene touching, wet
finger to glass harmonica, extorting soft
squeals from the open-to-sky groundlings
in raingear. Above, I grip the thick balcony wall
fending off all temptation overboard,
knowing for once exactly why mountain
stormholds and Shakespeare petrify
the too-deep seer into their ravines, their
shared fathomless language. Here we are, side
by side with the Secret, we’re peering, abyss-gazing,
steeping our eyes. Made it, Ma! Top of the World!
_________________
Thanks, Tom! Our new Historian-in-Residence, Tom Goff, was responding to our Seed of the Week [see last Tuesday's post]. The last of contributors/subscriber copies of Rattlesnake Review's current issue, #18, has gone into the mail; let me know if you don't get yours by the end of next week. Check out Tom's new California-poets-from-the-past column in it, which he has begun by profiling our first Poet Laureate, Ina Coolbrith.
This weekend in (smokin'!—cough, cough) NorCal poetry:
•••Saturday (6/28), 7-9 PM: The Show celebrates 8 years of poetry and music with poets RheaSunshine and Ebony Bones, plus jazz vocalist Lady Kitty Griffin. Wo'se Community Center, 2863 35th St., Sacramento. $5; free for first 15 people. Info: 916-208-7638.
•••Saturday (6/28), 4-6 PM: Open mic in Coffee Town, 134 S. Auburn St., Grass Valley.
•••Monday (6/30), 7:30 PM: Sacramento Poetry Center presents Stephen Kessler and Jeff Knorr at Time-Tested Books, [NOTE location change], 1114 21st St., Sacramento. Open mic after. Stephen Kessler is a poet, translator, essayist, editor and novelist whose work has appeared in hundreds of publications across the United States since the late 1960s. He is the author of eight books and chapbooks of original poetry and a dozen books of poetry and fiction in translation, including the works of the likes of Cesar Vallejo, Luis Cernuda, Julio Cortázar, Fernando Alegria, Ariel Dorfman, Juan Felipe Herrera, and 1977 Nobel Laureate Vicente Aleixandre as well as hundreds of essays, articles, columns, reviews and interviews in dozens of periodicals, mostly in the San Francisco Bay Area. He is the former editor of Alcatraz, an international journal, and The Sun, a Santa Cruz weekly, among other magazines and newspapers; the current editor of the quarterly literary newspaper, The Redwood Coast Review; and the author of the yet-to-be-published novel, The Mental Traveler.
Jeff Knorr is the author of the three books of poetry: The Third Body (Cherry Grove Collections, 2007), Keeper (Mammoth Books), and Standing Up to the Day (Pecan Grove Press). His other works include the co-authored Mooring Against the Tide: Writing Poetry and Fiction (Prentice Hall); the anthology, A Writer's Country (Prentice Hall); and The River Sings: An Introduction to Poetry (Prentice Hall). His poetry and essays have appeared in numerous literary journals and anthologies including Chelsea, Connecticut Review, The Journal, Red Rock Review, Barrow Street, and Like Thunder: Poets Respond to Violence in America ( University of Iowa, 2002). Jeff Knorr lives in California 's Central Valley and is Professor of literature and creative writing at Sacramento City College.
On the Monday after that (July 7), SPC will feature an Asian Poetry Reading with Frances Kakugawa.
_________________
EVENSONGS
—Virginia Hamilton Adair
In the days before RV's
the sound of tent pegs being driven in was music,
and the whisper, then crackle, of a wood fire
getting underway.
After the steak smells and the cleanup,
it was bliss to lie back against a log
and just listen:
an owl, announcing the evening hunt,
an unseen mother calling, Juny, Juny.
At a distance, a chord on a guitar,
a few bars on a mouth organ.
With my head on his shoulder,
my husband began to sing "St. James Infirmary"
mellow, seductive, and slightly off-key.
A song for necrophiliacs. Poe would have loved it.
Downwind we heard the harmonica and guitar
joined by a flute, feeling their way into a trio.
The owl called close by
and the darkening fire gave a long sigh,
as if falling asleep.
___________________
Today's LittleNip:
TIME SPANS
—A.R. Ammons
What lightning
strikes
in an
instant the
boulder hums
all year.
___________________
—Medusa
SnakeWatch: What's Up With Rattlesnake Press
New in June: Day Moon, a new chapbook by James DenBoer, and Mindfully Moon, a littlesnake broadside by Carol Louise Moon, as well as Volume Three of Conversations, our third book of interviews by B.L. Kennedy, featuring Art Beck, Olivia Costellano, Quinton Duval, William S. Gainer, Mario Ellis Hill, Kathryn Hohlwein, James Jee Jobe, Andy Jones, Rebecca Morrison, Viola Weinberg and Phillip T. Nails. All this PLUS a brand-new edition (#18) of Rattlesnake Review! Now available at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sacramento, or (soon) from rattlesnakepress.com/. (Snake contributors and subscribers will be receiving their copies in the mail this week and next. If you're not among either of these, and can't get down to The Book Collector to get your free copy, send me two bux and I'll mail you one: P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726.)
The Snake will be snoozing through July and August, leaving Medusa to carry on alone. Then on September 10, we shall burst back onto the scene with Ten Poems, a new chapbook from Patrick Grizzell; #2 in Katy Brown's series of blank journals (Musings Two: Vices, Virtues and Obsessions); plus Issue #19 of Rattlesnake Review (deadline is August 15). Meanwhile, look in on Medusa every day, and, for heaven's sake, keep sending stuff! The snakes of Medusa are always hungry...
Medusa's Weekly Menu:
(Contributors are welcome to cook up something for any and all of these!)
Monday: Weekly NorCal poetry calendar
Tuesday: Seed of the Week: Tuesday is Medusa's day to post poetry triggers such as quotes, forms, photos, memories, jokes—whatever might tickle somebody's muse. Pick up the gauntlet and send in your poetic results; and don't be shy about sending in your own triggers, too! All poems will be posted and a few of them will go into Medusa's Corner of each Rattlesnake Review. Send your work to kathykieth@hotmail.com or P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726. No deadline for SOW; respond today, tomorrow, or whenever the muse arrives. (Print 'em out, maybe, save 'em for a dry spell?) When you send us work, though, just let us know which "seed" it was that inspired you.
Wednesday: HandyStuff Quickies: Resources for the poet, including whatever helps ease the pain of writing and/or publishing: favorite journals to read and/or submit to; books, etc., about writing; organizational tools—you know—HandyStuff! Tell us about your favorite tools.
Thursday: B.L.'s Drive-Bys: Micro-reviews by our irreverent Reviewer-in-Residence, B.L. Kennedy. Send books, CDs, DVDs, etc. to him for possible review (either as a Drive-By or in future issues of Rattlesnake Review) at P.O. Box 160664, Sacramento, CA 95816.
Friday: NorCal weekend poetry calendar
Daily (except Sunday): LittleNips: SnakeFood for the Poetic Soul: Daily munchables for poetic thought, including short paragraphs, quotes, wonky words, silliness, little-known poetry/poet facts, and other inspiration—yet another way to feed our ravenous poetic souls.
And poetry! Every day, poetry from writers near and far! The Snakes of Medusa are always hungry.......!
_________________
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). And be sure to sign up for Snakebytes, our monthly e-newsletter that will keep you up-to-date on all our ophidian chicanery.
