—Poetry by Tom Goff, Carmichael, CA
—Photos of Tiffany Lamps Courtesy of Public Domain
IRONIES YOUNG AND OLD
For James Lee Jobe
Dear James, your poem on ironies of strength
And youthful ignorance, versus a savvy weakness,
Hits home. How is it we only after great length
Of years more fully realize what sickness,
Not health, can do to nourish the wise mind?
Both shriveled and wise but dizzy—is this “wizened?”—
What richer taste our tongues catch: the white rind,
Not the sweet melon apex, life at this end,
Pleases just slipping past jaded faint taste buds.
The heldentenor Albert Niemann sang,
Young and old, the Wagner heroes all.
Among the sensitives, not with the studs,
He felt his knowledge of Tristan firmly rang
Late, late. It was the old voicebox he heard pall.
For James Lee Jobe
Dear James, your poem on ironies of strength
And youthful ignorance, versus a savvy weakness,
Hits home. How is it we only after great length
Of years more fully realize what sickness,
Not health, can do to nourish the wise mind?
Both shriveled and wise but dizzy—is this “wizened?”—
What richer taste our tongues catch: the white rind,
Not the sweet melon apex, life at this end,
Pleases just slipping past jaded faint taste buds.
The heldentenor Albert Niemann sang,
Young and old, the Wagner heroes all.
Among the sensitives, not with the studs,
He felt his knowledge of Tristan firmly rang
Late, late. It was the old voicebox he heard pall.
PINK HYDRANGEAS
Of all the flowers in your mother’s garden,
These summon our most diligent attentions,
These warm green saw-edged leaves must never darken
With scorch marks from the sun. My obligation
Is to indulge these water-needy leaves
And stems with sprays from the hose that saturate,
From slurping roots to umbels, plants like thieves
Who cheat even bamboo runners. Satiate
Self-staining, self-fading petals whose pink turns
June-hot, the stronger pink the more they’re wet.
To keep them alive and pampered so none burns,
My lot: good trust to have and not forget,
Trust delegated by you, my many-faceted
Lady of arts and abilities, indulgent
Toward me: what many moods and quirks you’ve cossetted.
Our union, hydrangeas at height, pink flares refulgent.
Of all the flowers in your mother’s garden,
These summon our most diligent attentions,
These warm green saw-edged leaves must never darken
With scorch marks from the sun. My obligation
Is to indulge these water-needy leaves
And stems with sprays from the hose that saturate,
From slurping roots to umbels, plants like thieves
Who cheat even bamboo runners. Satiate
Self-staining, self-fading petals whose pink turns
June-hot, the stronger pink the more they’re wet.
To keep them alive and pampered so none burns,
My lot: good trust to have and not forget,
Trust delegated by you, my many-faceted
Lady of arts and abilities, indulgent
Toward me: what many moods and quirks you’ve cossetted.
Our union, hydrangeas at height, pink flares refulgent.
SOME TIFFANY FOR BREAKFAST
For Nora on our anniversary
The delicate-hued skies of a Tiffany lamp
—The many-pieced jigsaw-designs, all those milk-fed
Evanescences, emulate the lit damp
Of dusk when fireflies lift their stars to the silken
Heavens—to fit together, are laced with lead,
Lead tracery (cames) that should be awkward thick
But bind with ebony evenness unbled
To ambient layers that gauze and glaze, no click,
No seam that frays glass, no snap or pop from place,
That is us, that is our marital design,
Strong girdering, yet no such corset lace
As wrenched my mom’s bad back into ruler-straight line.
Are your thoughts layered like plies that shade the depths
In Tiffany’s Da Vinci-sunset sfumato?
Are mine the dense black borderlines whose lengths
No Tiffany girl lets overlap their bounds?
Can anyone tell who composed the solid ground
Bass against which the whole glow plays obbligato?
Goffered lamp-edges billow like window valances.
Those curious globs downside called prunts,
Eccentric ornaments, can’t seem stuck-on stunts.
Time-fashion, Time-scorning form, twin scales that balance.
COUNTING THE WAYS
Uncanny how terse tags will long outlive
The vastest spans of work by their creator.
A letter-writer to the Times* must give,
With “Let me count the ways,” an active-crater-
Puffed whiff of snark with which to plume her say
On our poor health care system. And she counts:
Three types of inadequate on stark display
In her adroit summation. Which amounts
To cliché repurposed from raptures by Browning,
Elizabeth Barrett, who uttered utter love
In her famed “Portuguese” sonnet, never-frowning
Ardor, desire’s hand-shaped, buttery glove
To shuck as lovers discard whole skins in death.
Decrepit words, malice-shocked, recoup their breath.
*Felicia Nimue Ackerman, “Ailing Aid,” in
The New York Times Book Review Letters section,
6/11/21
_____________________
Today’s LittleNip:
An archeologist is the best husband a woman can have. The older she gets, the more interested he is in her.
—Agatha Christie
_____________________
Tom Goff and Nora Staklis’s silver wedding anniversary was Tuesday, June 15. Congratulations to this creative power couple! And thanks, also, to Tom for his fine poetry today, including three smooth Sonnets (can you tell which kinds?) and something a bit longer, but just as smoothly rhymed. A fine minstrel of sound, Tom is.
_____________________
—Medusa
Uncanny how terse tags will long outlive
The vastest spans of work by their creator.
A letter-writer to the Times* must give,
With “Let me count the ways,” an active-crater-
Puffed whiff of snark with which to plume her say
On our poor health care system. And she counts:
Three types of inadequate on stark display
In her adroit summation. Which amounts
To cliché repurposed from raptures by Browning,
Elizabeth Barrett, who uttered utter love
In her famed “Portuguese” sonnet, never-frowning
Ardor, desire’s hand-shaped, buttery glove
To shuck as lovers discard whole skins in death.
Decrepit words, malice-shocked, recoup their breath.
*Felicia Nimue Ackerman, “Ailing Aid,” in
The New York Times Book Review Letters section,
6/11/21
_____________________
Today’s LittleNip:
An archeologist is the best husband a woman can have. The older she gets, the more interested he is in her.
—Agatha Christie
_____________________
Tom Goff and Nora Staklis’s silver wedding anniversary was Tuesday, June 15. Congratulations to this creative power couple! And thanks, also, to Tom for his fine poetry today, including three smooth Sonnets (can you tell which kinds?) and something a bit longer, but just as smoothly rhymed. A fine minstrel of sound, Tom is.
_____________________
—Medusa
How can you ever forget this pretty face?
—Public Domain Photo
—Public Domain Photo
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.
Would you like to be a SnakePal?
All you have to do is send poetry and/or
photos and artwork to
kathykieth@hotmail.com. We post
work from all over the world, including
that which was previously-published.
Just remember:
the snakes of Medusa are always hungry—
for poetry, of course!
