Siren Dance

 

Runes

—Poetry, Photos and Original Artwork

by Joyce Odam, Sacramento, CA

 

AS SHE CUTS MY HAIR

I stare
for a long time
at the three buds of roses
then realize     they are made
of sea shells      I thought
they were     satin     she
brought them from Guam she said
“from home”  where they are
common…
                   but “here"
                               such
                                       roses
are as unique     as her own exotic
look    her hair dyed two colors
facial bones      of a dancer
gold bracelets and chains
around her neck and wrists,
and rings on every finger
                                         as
                                               she
                                                      dips
                                          and sways
                                    and moves as
                             if to music
                  around my chair
as   she  cuts   my   hair.

 

 

 

Isolation of Self

 

SELF CONTAINMENT

I am the hope of myself.
I am a bowl into which
I pour a sea.
I am a land
surrounding myself.  

I am the face which
looks into both reflections
and sees the one.
I am the one.
I am the other.

I stretch out my body
to feel movement.
I am the movement I feel.

In the bowl of my hands
fish swim
and rise to my surfaces
to look at the sky.

I am the sky of myself.
I pull the self-birds
through the wet air
of illusion…
of reality …

                
(prev. pub. in Medusa’s Kitchen, 1/18/11)

 

 

 

Siren Dance

 

SEA HAG   

She dances her bony siren-dance on the     
shrouding shore as you in your shanty
stir your clam-bisque on your small
wood stove, she offers a gull-feather

in return for just one bowl, she offers
to dance all night for you—as memory
as mist—she laughs her awful laugh.
Snuff the candle. Lock the gate. Evoke

some half-forgotten rune that will send
her away—don’t risk your soul for hers,
she lives in the sea and cannot be
appeased. Resist! She cannot be saved.

 

 

 

Caught in a Dream

 

 

THE SKY INVISIBLE

seagulls drift in the white sky
and are not amazed that it is night
and my dream of them

they cry their white cries
and search for themselves
in the translucent dark

all night they make the sky invisible
and my sleep that harbors them
I am held in dreams’ white soaring

                                       
(prev. pub. in Medusa’s Kitchen, 6/26/12)

 

 

 

Invisible Sky

 

THE SHORELINE AT DUSK

This haunted shore, at dusk,
everything turning blue,

that old spectre here again
in thinning light that shines

through his body—
but I no longer go through ghosts

that appear, and disappear—
the sea behind them,

churning the years away,
sad as time that holds back

some old distance, some recall—
I would walk alone here,

my shore—my hour—
to be alone on this old beach—

all the promises turning to sand,
seaweed catching at my feet.

 

 

 

 Who Cannot Swim

 

THE SEVERANCE LINE

oh the boat with its endless people
goes forth to drown

goes forth to tip over and spill them
gasping and thrashing down

all the children and fathers and
mothers and friends who cannot swim

look how they dazzle the water
with their startled eyes

and there the boat lies
upside down      looking for them

and the water stares quietly back
growing sleepy in the sun


(prev. pub. in The Wormwood Review, 1973)

 

 

 

 At The Peripheral

 

 

SEVEN GULLS ON SEVEN STRINGS

Seven gulls on seven strings
hang in white stillness
in the hall doorway, no breeze
disturbs them, much lest
lets them clink, nor lets them cry,
nothing shall break them—
nothing shall take them from me.
They shall never fly.

                                 
(prev. pub. in Poets’ Forum Magazine, 1997)

____________________

Today’s LittleNip:

NIGHTS BY THE SUMMER OCEAN
(Balboa, 1941)
—Joyce Odam

Shallow waders,
wet roar of invisible dark waves,
brushing ourselves with shining hands—
our phosorprescence.

____________________

Our thanks to Joyce Odam this morning for her lovely talk of the sea, triggered by our Seed of the Week: Seashells. She has sent us some forms, too: “Seven Gulls on Seven Strings” is an Imago (eight lines in alternating syllables, 7 5 7 5 7 5 7 5). And “Sea Hag” is based on a Word-Challenge—another word for the Word-Can Poem, except the words to use come from a person and not a can. This poem was based on “bisque, feather, candle, gate, evoke, bony”. Joyce also sent us two other form poems: a Bradford Sonnet, and a mighty Sestina. Those will be posted this coming Friday with the Form Fiddlers. Tune in then for more form festivities!

Our new Seed of the Week is “Secrets”. Send your poems, photos & artwork about this (or any other) subject to kathykieth@hotmail.com. No deadline on SOWs, though, and for a peek at our past ones, click on “Calliope’s Closet”, the link at the top of this column, for plenty of others to choose from. And see every Form Fiddlers’ Friday for poetry form challenges, including those of the Ekphrastic type.

____________________

—Medusa

 

 

 

Surfistas

—Photo Courtesy of
Public Domain

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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