The deer, a doe,
ears forward focused,
wet nosed,
eyes clear,
muscles coiled,
wild fear
—Photo and poem by Ronald Edwin Lane, Colfax
_____________________
AMY WINEHOUSE
(a linvillanelle)
—Tom Goff, Carmichael
Amy Winehouse is dead and unborn songs
gone the way of Poets Against War.
Too drenched in thigh-level mud to change her life,
drug-addled, eyeliner swooshed up thick with
shadow like snakes-in-the-almonds, like scimitars.
Her serpent eye-glade owned no inner lids,
no screening the gaze from beatblack blues that fueled
her sensuous loss, her resonator mouth,
and sad the love-glint on each Chiclet tooth.
*
And sad the love-glint on each Chiclet tooth.
Her sensuous loss. Her resonator mouth.
Too drenched in thigh-level mud to change her life,
Amy Winehouse is dead, and unborn songs
her serpent eye-glade owned. No inner lids:
gone the way of Poets Against War,
no screening the gaze from beatblack blues that fueled
drug-addled eyeliner swooshed up thick with
shadow like snakes-in-the-almonds, like scimitars.
*
Shadow like snakes-in-the-almonds, like scimitars,
drug-addled eyeliner swooshed up thick, with
no screening the gaze from beatblack blues. That fueled
her sensuous loss, her resonator mouth.
Her serpent eye-glade owned no inner lids,
and sad the love-glint on each Chiclet tooth
gone the way of Poets Against War…
Too drenched in thigh-level mud to change her life,
Amy Winehouse is dead—and all those unborn songs.
_____________________
BAT MUSIC
—Taylor Graham, Placerville
Myotis murmurs with Pipistrelle
under the high corners and eaves of our
house hushing itself into twilight—
muffled bark of dogs across the canyon—
gibbous moon not yet claiming
the surface of the pond. I listen for our
home-bats nuzzling, chirping, jostling,
ready to slip out into this July
evening. And then, one after another,
they come surging overhead, rushing past
us on waves of air. We keep watch—
32… 83-85… 125 bats tonight—
each dark zig catching its arc, its echo-
vector above a dimming hillside,
over the pond where shadows collect.
Moonrise, earth-spin, a cosmic
hoop. But we'll be lost in sleep unbound
by words, on wheels of memory,
dream, mosquito-hum, bat-shout.
______________________
THE GARDEN OF GOOD FORTUNE
—Taylor Graham
acrylic on the waiting-room wall
A cup, a key, fine children, a dainty house—
strange blossoms in this painted garden,
muted topaz and mauve, a box of secrets.
Girls spent their lives making hats -
I imagine flat-beds, puller-downs, flanges.
As people enter and pass through doors,
I couldn't pick one flower from this frame—
blue-eyes faded to worn denim,
a long way to puzzle out what's given.
*
A long way to puzzle out what's given:
girls spent their lives making hats,
blue eyes faded to worn denim.
I couldn't pick one flower from this frame—
muted topaz and mauve, a box of secrets,
strange blossoms in this painted garden—
a cup, a key, fine children, a dainty house.
I imagine flat-beds, puller-downs, flanges
as people enter and pass through doors.
*
As people enter and pass through doors,
I couldn't pick one flower. From this frame,
girls spent their lives making hats;
I imagine flat-beds, puller-downs, flanges,
strange blossoms in this painted garden.
Muted topaz and mauve, a box of secrets:
blue eyes faded to worn denim;
a cup, a key, fine children, a dainty house;
a long way to puzzle out what's given.
________________________
DREAMWALK
—Taylor Graham
Roman-marble pillars sparkle in the sun.
Whose rising eye sees spectacles?
She walks blind through haunted ruins,
reaching with empty hands.
The truth being always something else—
chicken-wire snags after fox got the hens,
brown boots lined up by a muddy door.
How night dims into daylight.
She wakes again to her own life.
*
She wakes again to her own life
reaching with empty hands.
How night dims into daylight,
brown boots lined up by a muddy door.
She walks blind through haunted ruins
whose rising eye sees spectacles:
Roman-marble pillars; sparkle in the sun;
the truth being always something else;
chicken-wire snags after fox got the hens.
*
Chicken-wire snags after fox got the hens.
Brown boots lined up by a muddy door
reaching with empty hands.
The truth being always something else
whose rising eye sees spectacles,
she walks blind through haunted ruins.
How night dims into daylight,
Roman-marble pillars sparkle in the sun.
She wakes again to her own life.
_____________________
inky blue
—charles mariano, sacramento
this morning
while clearing space
found two caps
without pens
found another
under a pile of pages
three more
on the shelf
next to a book
by Steinbeck
caps, without pens
orphans
i suppose
as long as i have
the other end
don't need the caps
there they are
sadly collected,
homeless
my dearest friend
died yesterday
news learned
coincidentally
while attending a funeral
for another friend
all these pens
without caps
and this
painfully blue
ink
stifled, undone
____________________
YOSEMITE MEADOW
—Claire J. Baker, Pinole
Come, let us wander among
flocks of poppies, watch
a peak's shadow ease over
the meadow like a whisper
heard only by summer
& the prince of wild grass.
Sprawling among wildflowers,
butterflies & lady bugs
we do not separate
petals from wings,
the mountain and meadow
from our bloodstream.
____________________
J is throwing ham slices
at E while one of them
is dating R heavily
and M nearly got ran over
because of it.
A just slept away
a result of late nights out
with C who cannot hold
his drink since his accident
involving S who just hates
the freeways after the way
B would drive her to see L
or M or J or B
maybe K who is hung up
too much on C
will start seeing G
who is so involved with F
that K may go back to B after all.
D forever waits for inspiration
while I plans to dream longer
than either H or B or C
or even S can hope for.
—Michael Cluff, Highland, CA
_____________________
REAL REDHEADS
—Patricia Hickerson, Davis
Grandma was a redhead
I never met her she lived so long ago
she was a brave redhead with ten kids
captured by the Brits in 1780
dragged to a Wyandotte village
lived only to 53
died of ‘dropsy’
says so in the family Bible
I revere her…
doesn’t say anywhere that she was a redhead
but I know it; story’s been handed down
Grandpa was a redhead, too, six foot five
big scary giant of a man
staring bright blue eyes
lived to be 90
their kids were all redheads
that’s what I’m told
it’s probably true
even if I’m a lying bitch of a poet
______________________
Today's LittleNip(s):
FROM A NEW ANTHOLOGY
(Thanks to Brenda Hillman)
—Claire J. Baker
I must
read more
from the poet
who wrote
of a thrush
& its golden
eyebrow.
______________________
I sailed ‘cross the ocean blue
To get to the land of green
Home of the new classified ads
But then I found they were
Back where I’d been
Sitting ‘neath the frogs on their pads
—Caschwa, Sacramento
______________________
Thanks for the LittleNip, Cashwa (the Poet Formerly Known as Carl Bernard Schwartz)! The “frogs” Carl is referring to are his fanciful interpretation of our green box on the “bulletin board” at the right of this column. Which segues nicely into how I spent quite a bit of time yesterday cleaning up the Kitchen: tightening up various instructions to make them more concise, checking all the links to make sure they still work, updating the Snake on a Rod pages which had fallen behind. In the Ticklers section (Bigger Blue Box at the very bottom of the page) I put poor Charlie Sheen to rest, deleting the poems about him which have become just plain sad. And I added another new feature: Word of the Day, at the bottom of that green box. There are several Word/Day sites on the Web, but I chose this one for its clarity, lack of ads, pronunciation complete with sound—and because yesterday’s word was “porcine”, having to do with pigs, with which I have a great affinity. Enjoy.
In cleaning up the links, I stumbled across some readings and other goodies; you might want to scan the calendar. August 1, for example, is the deadline to sign up for the UC Davis Extension Tomales Bay Workshop, which is pricey but intriguing. They only accept 12 attendees; the deadline applies “until they have enough people”. Keynote speaker: Jamaican poet Kwame Dawes. See extension.ucdavis.edu/unit/arts_and_humanities/course/listing/?unit=ARTS&prgList=WRT&coursearea=Writing for more.
Thanks to today's multitude of contributors, including our two TG’s, Taylor Graham and Tom Goff, for tackling Cynthia Linville’s Linvillanelle. Tom writes: Some poets just have the good luck of surnames that lend themselves perfectly to new forms...and the talent for those forms, too! Here's a linvillanelle (how that rolls off the tongue!). I didn't "intend" to write about the singer. It seems to me like a lament for all the insanity, in her, in Washington, in Norway. Good poems by Cynthia and by Joyce, and I love Ashland, so the Chautauqua bronze is most congenial.
Taylor Graham writes: What a fun new form! I couldn't stop at just one... The first two poems are responses to Katy Brown (7/23) and D.R. Wagner (7/25). What I love about this form is how it makes me rearrange the elements of the poem, and then rearrange them again, so there's no "real" order. Just what I need to get out of my rational, boring thought-rut. Please tell Cynthia how much I like it!
Speaking of D.R., don’t forget that he and Pat Grizzell will be reading TONIGHT at The Shine Café, 24th & E Sts., Sac. See b-board for more.
Finally, Pat Hickerson’s “redhead” poem today was triggered by our Poetry Trap of the Week. I especially like her last line……Maybe THAT should be our next Seed of the Week: Lyin’ bitch of a poet!
—Medusa
THAT NEWNESS
I forget sometimes,
Always, it seems,
I think I can, but
I can’t remember through my eyes,
That newness seen
For the first time
—Ronald Edwin Lane
