—Poems and Photos by Taylor Graham, Placerville, CA
KALEIDOSCOPE
We’re sitting at manual typewriters
inside the gallery’s open door. November
cold draft off the street. People come
and go, no one asks for a poem. We’re about
to pack up when a lady stops, considers;
she’d like a kaleidoscope poem.
In this gallery of white walls and bright art
prints, I remember. The magic tube of colors
shattered, mirrored to designs almost
beyond imagining then gone
with the slightest twist of wrist, never to
repeat; almost brighter than real.
In time my magic tube disappeared,
maybe to Goodwill while I was away
at school. Now, volutions of technology,
my iPad camera turns reality
to kaleidoscope, repeating designs
to puzzle the world-bound eye.
Same kind of magic? bright as imagination.
THE WILD BRIGADE
I love turkeys. I don’t mean the 19-pounder
from the supermarket that came vacuum-sealed
and had no attitude. I mean the five turkeys
who parade around our house, almost venturing
up the back steps. They act like they belong here,
and they do—though they vanish a few days
before Turkey Day and won’t reappear
till sometime in January. Wild fowl, they
won’t be vacuum-packed this year.
QUIET MARCH
Do wild turkeys protest the festival
nicknamed Turkey Day?
No, from field and fringe of oak wood,
from roadside and rural homestead
they take a vacation
to tangled deeps of wild land.
They simply disappear
until the New Year.
CLIMATE UPDATE
Late November before the first big rain,
the pond still summer-baked hard
and dry. No blue heron on the lagoon;
egret is gone from the wetlands mouth.
This landscape looks dead. But—
from oak and buckeye woods
comes a march of prehistoric silhouettes
scuffing, kicking up dead leaves in search
of acorns. Turkeys. Such a mess life makes.
Turkeys on the march, head-pumping
forward along the edge of what once
was water; not complaining querulous
when-will-it-rain? Dinosaurs among us;
passing, gone—up the hill where oaks
still let acorns fall, their living food.
WILDWOOD TURKEY SEASONS
June: female with 3 chicks; 1 day-roosting
in the oak that overhangs the field.
August: 7 by fox den, 1 calling from creek.
September: 7 strolling oak-rock hill
pecking acorns—watchful of Cowboy
padding softly, giving turkeys wide berth.
October: mornings and evenings, 8 toms
circled & circled the house. Early November,
3 toms did a circle-dance around the flock.
Was it a farewell dance?
PRAISE THE RAIN
On every boulder
the mosses are opening
their green mouths to sing
and the leafless twigs
gleam, rain-beaded with diamonds.
The eucalyptus
dances with all its leafy
feather-boa boughs.
Placerville Festival of Lights
RAIN ON MAIN
Festival of Lights, Nov 23
The rain stays on Main Street pavement,
traffic lanes a-blaze with soft reflected flame—
holiday lights, the same I recall from long-
gone ways—and people passing gaily walking,
calling, strolling in light rain. Some stop amazed
to see—in our awning’d bay, alcove of Ancient
Gold across from Custom Frames—our manual
typewriters of good-old-days. Does poetry pay?
Someone hands me a candy cane. We came
to type poems on request, on the spot.
Donation jar goes to charity. Pavement glistens
with rain, festive-day cheer, refrain of Sleigh
Ride, and I’ve lost my train of thought.
Rolling paper on platen, typing away, see where
it takes me. This man claims a poem for Alayne,
for twenty-eight years of his lady’s holiday-
radiant smile, soft and steady as snowflakes,
as rain. And still it rains, the first in half a year,
our winter blessing. See how the lady smiles.
My poem is the rain.
___________________
Today’s LittleNip:
NOVEMBER FARE
—Taylor Graham
Along the roadside
these Burma Shave-type signs that
read: Tune-Up Special,
Catalytic Converter,
Burritos, Eggs Benedict.
__________________
Thank you, Taylor Graham, for some rainy-day fare this morning! She writes, “I wrote "Rain on Main" for James Lee Jobe's The Other Voice Poetry Group online, and I just found out he's posting it on his Yolo County Poems blog at yolocountypoems.blogspot.com/.” For more about joining TOVPG, write to James at jamesleejobe@gmail.com/.
Poetry in our area tonight includes Poetry Unplugged at Luna’s Cafe in Sacramento at 8pm; or get funky at The Funky Good Time Poetry Event in Old Sacramento at Laughs Unlimited, also 8pm. Scroll down to the blue column (under the green column at the right) for info about these and other upcoming poetry events in our area—and note that more may be added at the last minute.
—Medusa
Celebrate poetry!
Photos in this column can be enlarged by
clicking on them once, then clicking on the x
in the top right corner to come back to Medusa.
