Photo by Ronald Edwin Lane
SNOWFLAKES IN THE SUN
—Ronald Edwin Lane, Weimar
Toss tumble umbels
Flower down
Petals pure
Display as one
Dancing with the wind
And catching sun
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AUTUMN BEGAN AT 11:32 A.M. OCTOBER 3rd
—Daniel Williams, Wawona
I know because I was in the forest
Then a day that began sultry
Under dark cloud. I had just gained
The summit of a knob covered with
Bear clover and young sugar pine
When something touched my face
Like a chill cobweb unexpected
And sudden in the ambient warmth
Above my head the pines began to
Move with that ghostly freight train
Sound of trees in wind
My watch said 11:32 a.m.
Little rain for seven months
Dust choking and thick
Shrubs limp grasses sere
Trees dripping resin
That night I slept with my window open
I wished to hear the rain begin
I wanted to celebrate it in my sleep
All night the simple music of downpour
Entwined with phantoms in my dreams
Started at 11:32 p.m.
Morning in the valley
Fresh with the scent of rain
Great mists crawling up granite walls
Waterfalls flowing
The river still in large pools reflecting
On its bank
Fog streamers blowing through alder
Banana yellow leaves tiny hearts settling
A carpet of sedges and horsetail fern
Blessed wet delicious cold
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Thanks, Daniel and Ron! Our apologies to Daniel Williams for calling him David in Rattlesnake Review #19, and for saying he was from somewhere other than Wawona.
Our Rattlesnake Press release at The Book Collector tonight (Weds., Oct. 8) will feature a new rattlechap from Moira Magneson (He Drank Because) and a littlesnake broadside from Hatch Graham (Circling of the Pack). That's at the Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sacramento, 7:30 PM. Refreshments and a read-around will follow; bring your own poems or somebody else’s.
Coupla up-and-coming workshops, one local, one not-so:
•••Thursdays (10/16 and 10/23), 6-9 PM: The Learning Exchange presents Lytton Bell in an workshop entitled “Everyday Poetry”. $79. Info: www.lyttonbell.com/.
•••November 11-13: La Casa de Maria in Santa Barbara is having a workshop on poetry and healing led by former Sutter Writers’ Chipp (Lawrence) Spann. registerb@lcdm.org/.
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FROM THE 17th FLOOR OF THE MONT BLEU
SOUTH SHORE
—Daniel Williams
Looking out windows to the horizon what
You see is the word Horizon in neon
As though everything need be labeled
For the gamblers and fun time souls
Who may raise their eyes from cards or dice
Just beyond the Horizon
Lies a perfect lake bounded by its
Snow clotted mountains
The waters looking choppy and deep
Emerald and cobalt in swirls in morning
Light, navy and azure by mid afternoon
It is as if a young girl
Has pushed her blue basket into
Emerald ice and then has
Laid down in the basket
Her heat melting the ice
Making everything lovely and fresh
About 5 o’clock a great dark bird
Appears over the lake—
An elongated vee of flight
With feathers golden from the sun
As dusk appears golden feathers
Turn the color of red coals of oak
At the heart of fire rings
Until darkness flecked with crystals
Swallow the bird the girl the lake
And me
Leaving only a scarlet Horizon
Burning above an auto busy night
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TOURIST AND LUPINE
—Daniel Williams
I came around the curve just in time
To catch a still life rife with color
A man in shorts and yellow t-shirt
With ragged beard and wild hair
Poised with his camera over
The ravishing purple flames
Of a lupine in full bloom
He squinted against the west
Bound sun
His knee on the ground
Taking his full weight
In painful decomposed granite
He held his breath against the
Dying of the light
An orgasmic pre-second
Squeezed the shutter
Just as I rattled past
In a moment come and gone
Man and flower caught in one
Lovely symbiotic image
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PIGEON AT THE UROLOGIST'S WINDOW
—Daniel Williams
What the attraction could be
For a pigeon on this particular ledge
Three stories up at the VA
Might be anybody’s guess—
My little gray and blue buddy
Peering through the glass
With one encircled yellow eye
And I looking to him
For comforting distraction
while lying on my side
my pants around my ankles
my innards being probed in the
Most intimate way that a man
May be probed
Ignoring the discomfort
I imagine a worldlier pigeon
Telling this one
About this strange window
Three flights up at the VA
Where a bird may see
Amazing and wondrous sights
Pulling up my pants while
Doctor pecks at his keyboard
My winged cooing voyeur and I
Both say a prayer, he to the god
Of wind and I to the god of rain
And without a glance backward
We both take our grateful flight
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HAVE YOU LISTENED
across the Rim of Fire
for a rumor encircling the globe like
the breath of Mount St Helens
on the next morning?
Could you sweep St Augustine’s ash
from your doorstep
and not wonder about living
inside this volcano?
Might it make you wander
a lava landscape at night with no moon
till your boot-soles erode away?
Those lights in the distance—
what Morse do they blink?
What messages from burned-out
constellations?
Could you catch a falling
star incoming?
What rumors does it whistle
from the explosive
dark?
—Taylor Graham, Placerville
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Thanks, TG, for your response to yesterday's Seed of the Week: Poems in the form of questions.
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Today's LittleNip:
BULLETIN
—A.R. Ammons
I mentioned trimming
the bushes and
the squirrels cleared
their nuts out of there
—Medusa
SnakeWatch: What's New from Rattlesnake Press:
Coming in October: October’s release at The Book Collector on Weds., Oct. 8, will feature a new rattlechap from Moira Magneson (He Drank Because) and a littlesnake broadside from Hatch Graham (Circling of the Pack). That's at the Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sacramento, 7:30 PM. Refreshments and a read-around will follow; bring your own poems or somebody else’s.
Then, on Thursday, Oct. 30, 8 PM, Rattlesnake Press will release two SpiralChaps to honor and celebrate Luna’s Café, including a new collection of art and poetry from B.L. Kennedy (Luna’s House of Words) and an anthology of Luna’s poets, artists and photographs (La Luna: Poetry Unplugged at Luna’s Café) edited by Frank Andrick. Come travel with our Away Team as we leave the Home of the Snake for a brief road trip/time travel to Luna’s Café, 1414 16th St., Sacramento to celebrate Art Luna and the 13 years of Luna's long-running poetry series. Who knows what auspicious adventures await us there??
And check out B.L. Kennedy’s interview with Art Luna in the latest Rattlesnake Review (#19)! Free copies are available at The Book Collector, or send me two bux and I’ll mail you one (address below). Next deadline, by the way, is November 15.
Coming in November: November will feature a new rattlechap from Red Fox Underground Poet Wendy Patrice Williams (Some New Forgetting); a littlesnake broadside from South Lake Tahoe Poet Ray Hadley; our 2009 calendar from Katy Brown (Beyond the Hill: A Poet’s Calendar) as well as Conversations, Vol. 4 of B.L. Kennedy’s Rattlesnake Interview Series. That’s Weds., November 12, 7:30 PM at The Book Collector.
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 SOWs; 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 (sometimes): 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 and in-between! The Snakes of Medusa are always hungry.......!
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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.
