COMING UPON HUMPTY DUMPTY
Do you mind if I sit here on this wall
awhile with you? I’m feeling a bit
fragile and a bit blue.
And I have this touch of vertigo
I hope will pass. Sometimes
I feel like I’m made of glass
about to shatter.
But you’re so cute,
though you do seem apprehensive—
not quite steady;
and you do seem to wobble
quite a bit.
Do I make you nervous
with my chatter?
I’d like to just sit here
while my anxieties pass—
feel the breeze—
watch the view
while I gather back my indecisions.
How about you?
You look about as out-of-kilter as I feel
_____________________
THE HUNDRED-YEAR SLEEP
Will you just kiss her, as though
she breathes under her death-sleep
and will merely waken at your kiss?
Will her lips remember
what a moan is for—or how to open
for a word? Will her dead eyes open?
Beware such mourning—
the old tales are true—you,
the hero of her dreamed darkness,
there at last:
how long she has waited . . .
how deeply she loves you . . .
MULTIPLICITIES
Synchronization:
What does this have to do with memory,
this little love,
this heroic sacrifice—
time into time—lost before it is taken—
two meetings that recognize, then suffer loss . . .
what has this to do with memory?
Enigma:
So much begins . . .
but what is so, and what is much?
Say what you will—
there is no difference
between here and gone. They are the same.
The difference is time,
but there is no difference, so there is no time.
We are back to much. That much I know.
Accusation and Defense:
Love is so difficult of meaning.
Innocent at first.
It has no guilt.
It is not in danger of being changed
or changing.
So much for influence.
What happens is always at fault.
Blame is born of situation—
love the victim of both—
the innocence and the blame.
Dimensional:
What is circular that so much fits—
only that it’s round and therefore
comforting.
No hard edges, meaning corners—
and one can continue endlessly
round and round
on endless measurement of arrival,
though you never leave where you are.
So much depends.
____________________
PIERROT
Under his laugh—under
his white costume—his black
skull cap—Pierrot scoffs at his tears.
~
In a stance of ease,
one hand gestured at foolishness,
Pierrot hunches his shoulders.
~
On the empty stage, bracing against
the encroaching bare wall,
Pierrot loses his shadow.
~
In a pithy spiel,
Pierrot angles his head, sharpens his
eyes and hints at their secret.
~
In his white voluminous costume of
wrinkles and folds, Pierrot turns and
flutters his hand—just so: Pierrot is Pierrot.
___________________
Today's LittleNip:
FOOLS, RUSHING IN
How we wish for love
—even after loss.
As stubborn as fools.
Soon the sorrow?
Risk the old regrets?
Never mind the cost
—discover new tools.
Once more we’ll love.
(first pub. in Poets' Forum Magazine, 2004)
__________________
—Medusa, with thanks to Joyce Odam for today's poems and pix! Thankfully, Joyce is home again and able to send us these, despite fracturing her hip only a little more than a week ago!
—Photo by Kathy Kieth
For more photos of San Francisco, see
the new album on Medusa's Facebook page!
And hopefully that will inspire you for our new
Seed of the Week: San Francisco.
Send your thoughts about Baghdad by the Bay,
past, present, or future,
to kathykieth@hotmail.com
