Forever Into Yesterday

—Photo by Ann Privateer

FREE FALLING

—Ann Privateer, Davis

I wake up and there’s all this dead hair
clinging to alive, growing hair still on my head
so I thread my fingers through it all
trying to capture strands that fall
and release them to the dust bin.
One or two always fly free
landing on eye lashes to annoy me.
I know it’s there, I can feel its ever so light
weight where gravity stopped its flight
like a ledge on a mountain
safe enough for hiking
and maybe for sleeping
but still, not a home.

_____________________

SUMMER SEASON

has a son called Gargantuan
because the days are long and full.
The Dream Queen breathed him
into being one night under a full moon
that was bigger than the fastest snake
and softer than a tarantula.
She taught him a new dance,
pasted pictures to his finger tips,
rescued a lock of his hair, and called it
love.  As the Cicadas sang softly—
she rocked him to sleep. 

—Ann Privateer 

—Photo by Ann Privateer

SUMMER IS
 

a yummy
dog biscuit
a rock hopping
creek side day
a skateboard
with friends
a swim party
with ice cream
it’s lazy mornings
and an afternoon nap
togetherness
or alone—summer
where did it go?

—Ann Privateer

Still Life With Burning Candle by Pieter Claesz

STILL LIFE WITH BURNING CANDLE

—Ann Privateer

The wings of life ravish my solitude
a preview to shadows burning off glare
gone are the days we used to call lewd
gone like the plum tree I know not where
its fruit-colored background painting returns
so silent now without a soul to tell
umbrella branches generously yearn
as the flame reflected in glass flickers
a mighty life force takes both friend and foe
a meteorite might fall to earth slow
with accuracy, nobody will know
the alpha and the omega both bend
wine, books, and spectacles are our friend.
Trim the taper, I seek that which is mine

all things created surely are divine.

_______________________

POETRY WAKE
—Taylor Graham, Placerville

Venetian blinds keep out mid-
summer sun, admitting just
a glow on the polished semi-gloss
of hardwood floors and metal folding
chairs. The poetry is gone. Not dead
but to be mourned. Someone
left the window just a touch ajar.
No breeze would come inside.
The poetry has flown. Too many
notions of how the words should sound,
and what they ought to mean.
It's too stuffy for a poem, too sober
for a breeze. Raise the window wider;
come outside. Let's see if we can
track those poems without the meter
of their feet, just the echo
of their passing, their heart's beat.

____________________

SOLITUDE SEEKING
—Taylor Graham

Up the ridge under Sirius—glimpses
of black sky through incense-cedar.
You could compose a star-map in your head,
distant silver lights named for heroes
of myth, the acts of the long dead. Meteor-
shower that night, we were hiking
to the canyon overlook. Solitude to inspire
a poet or—a saxophone? softly
from the south, not too distant. Just by
instants, blues as if jazz garnished
the natural woods like thrush-song on a day
especially blest. Notes drifting
cool-then-warm-then-cool-again, like
walking a forest verge in the dark
where tree-line segues into open swale.
No meteors that we could see, just
the changing alphabet of an August sky,
showers of music by bits and stars.

_______________________
 

EDGE OF THE RIVER
—Taylor Graham

The people on shore—a couple—knelt down
beside the river. They had no faces
as we floated by. My dog's face was set
on search. One bird flew lengthwise
up the current. What kind of bird? Just
a shadow on moving water; muddy mirror
reflecting nothing, everything;
concealing what it stole upstream to carry
away, away. The couple lit a votive
candle, but we were already past its light.
We were searching for a boy
in the water. We'd know him if we found
him, the only water-child today.
His parents had no faces anymore. We were
too far down the water moving
in the present tense forever into yesterday.

______________________

Today's LittleNip:

SLEEPY SUMMER

wants to play
to measure shadows
and calculate your height
to believe
the unbelievable
to sometimes vanish
like seasons do
then reappear
to return and rewrite
a sleepy poem
waiting in the wings
and to dream
to always dream.

—Ann Privateer

______________________

—Medusa

 —Photo by Ann Privateer