Sacramento Gay Men's Chorus sings Abba at
Crocker Art Museum
—Photo by Katy Brown, Davis
ACCIDENT
—Taylor Graham, Placerville
—Taylor Graham, Placerville
She left the music running, Death
and the Maiden giving up to Winterreise.
First hot day of almost-summer going
on fall. Lost keys scattered in drawers,
on pantry hooks, no clue, no clef, no treble
tremolo that they belonged to. She left
the front door open as if to let
Schubert escape himself. Or was she
thinking of Die Frau ohne Schatten? Without
shadow she moved by half-rests under
sun, her scent trailing down the sidewalk,
fading but alive in accidentals,
pavement cracks she always wished
to break her mother's back. But these
were only snippets. The spinet
long gone to a world of her own
forgetting.
____________________
SOUND AND SHADOW
—Olga Blu Browne, Sacramento
—Olga Blu Browne, Sacramento
Sound and silence sing as one:
"White is cold, Black is deep."
Their shadows now are silent.
(first pub. in Brevities)
____________________
THE COLOR OF EVIL
—Olga Blu Browne
I stand silent, sadness locked in.
My memories the weapon.
Dark fears of inward visions.
The scars of my soul echo within.
(first pub. in Brevities)
Sac. Gay Men's Chorus
—Photo by Katy Brown
INCONSOLABLE
—B.Z. Niditch, Brookline, MA
Almost alive
in your living room
watching Breathless
for the ninth time
you in your kimono
no one answers
the bell or phone
or questions where
we are terraced
or traced from time
by an indoor memory
or number of drinks
what comes next
to amuse, trying to forget
in mystery or illusion
of a melancholy season
wounded and reeling.
___________________
SUSPICION
—B.Z. Niditch
This must be
a great nightmare
in darkness to cover us
in blanket suspicion
at first light burning up
with a high cabin fever,
A heartsick somnambulist
wishes for water
from nightfall's escape,
we oscillate
like fawns by branches
to drink in liquid silences
shattered by time
buried in volcanoes
of half-speech
unearthed like a catwalk
by ripples of phantasms
while turning here,
My sheets move me
from a daybed,
destiny dawns
on tuned-up sounds
unhinged images
signal forlorn thoughts
deep within.
___________________
Our thanks to today's contributors, talking about our Seed of the Week, Inconsolable. And thanks to Katy Brown for the pix! For more photos of local events, see Medusa's Facebook page for the new album, Recent Readings, by Katy Brown and Michelle Kunert.
___________________
Today's LittleNip(s):
i may not be
well-known
or famous,
but i do
a hell of a lot of
whatever the hell it is
i do
***
scribbled so many notes,
my ears are full
***
well-known
or famous,
but i do
a hell of a lot of
whatever the hell it is
i do
***
scribbled so many notes,
my ears are full
***
don’t go in there
don’t go
too deep
too hard
to come back
—charles mariano, sacramento
__________________
—Medusa
Seven Poets who read at Crocker last Friday:
Shawn Pittard, Paco Marquez, Marilynn Price,
Allegra Silberstein, Katy Brown, Danyen Powell