This Combustible World

 

Lee Herrick
Cal. Poet Laureate Reads in Placerville, 9/8/23
—Poetry and Photos by Taylor Graham,
Sacramento, CA
—And then scroll down to
Form Fiddlers’ Friday for poetry by
Nolcha Fox, Joe Nolan and
Stephen Kingsnorth

MORNING MYSTERY ON THE TRAIL

There they lie in smithereens—OK, just 11 pieces, enough to identify as a busted pair of binoculars. Beside a resting bench on a trail climbing gently through trees. No vast vistas, no distant objects to magnify. How does one break binoculars without breaking oneself? No cliffs, no open mine shafts. One more question among so many on this morning’s hike unanswered but still worth the walk and the asking.

sunlight magnifies
what’s broken and tossed aside
glorifying shards 

 

 

 

 

TEMPTATIONS

Willow’s lit like dewy morning,
bramble berries for the plucking
two men from the shoreline fishing—
how shall I spend my time?

Black Phoebe sings another day
but August heat will have its way;
and still the moment begs me stay—
explore this trail to climb! 

 

 

 

COMBUSTIBLES

The field’s spring green
is sunburned now, waiting for a spark.

Just listen to the news,
our world is so combustible.

Under a charred log, an ember
keeps its hopes alive through winter.

How can we entrust our words
to paper, inclined to go up in flame?

Along the trail, tarweed blazes
yellow at sunup. 

 

 

 

 

HOARDERS HOME

2 wicker chairs teeter between hedge
and gravel shoulder climbing uncurbed
street up cemetery hill; the chairs
in shadow of over-leaning trees,
their untrimmed branches. I catch a glimpse
thru gate of cluttered front yard with no
room for chairs, I guess. Does anyone
come out to sit here, to ponder
the tricky slope from treasure to trash? 

 

 

 

 

 

WAITING EARLY AND LATE

On storefront sidewalk
a black-garbed figure sits on his pack
engrossed in a magazine, waiting
for the dollar store to open.
Not far away a man sits,
back turned to commuter traffic,
taking inventory of his pack,
maybe waiting for some good to come
of this new day.
Behind the strip-mall
in the dumpster corner,
half a dozen shopping carts are waiting
to be hauled away
with the rest of the business trash.
One cart has waited a very
along time, laced with last spring’s
twining vines green fading,
brittling to September tinder. 

 

 

 

NOTES FROM WALKING IN RAIN

Lions Park

At dawn’s rising, not
buckets, just
casually coming
down upon droughty
everything—
fields, parks, this disc
golf course—no one else
happens to be here
in light rain, so
jokingly early. The
key to a good morning’s walk
lies like a treasure
map. I list clues; my dog
noses each new
olfactory discovery,
peavine refreshed by rain,
Queen Anne’s lace in bloom
regal among
star
thistle and so many yet
unidentified but
vibrant
“weeds” known as
X?? I don’t keep count, and
yes, my disc golf score is
zero. 

 

 

 

 

 

Today’s LittleNip:

BEHIND THE STRIP-MALL
—Taylor Graham

This pile of litter, worn-out or new?
a polka-dot something, navy blue—
what kind of drink does this brewer spew?
So much trash, wouldn’t the dumpster do
instead of junked at-random on bare dirt?
Would it have hurt to hire a cleanup crew?

_______________________

Thanks to Taylor Graham for today’s fine fall poetry and photos! Forms she has sent us include a Haibun (“Morning Mystery on the Trail”); some Normative Syllabics (“Hoarders Home”); a Stevenson (“Temptations”); an Alphabet Poem (“Notes from Walking in Rain”); a Small Ghazal (“Combustibles”); and a Gwawdodyn Hir (“Behind the Strip-Mall”). The Gwawdodyn Hir and the Small Ghazal were last week’s Triple-F Challenges.

I hear that last week was particularly edifying in El Dorado County poetry, with a visit by Calif. Poet Laureate Lee Herrick, as EDC poets welcome their new Poet Laureate Stephen Meadows. Taylor Graham got a nice shot of Lee Herrick, which she has passed on to us. For info about El Dorado County poetry events, past and future, go to Taylor Graham’s Western Slope El Dorado poetry on Facebook: www.facebook.com/ElDoradoCountyPoetry/, This week brings the Poetry in Motion read-around in Placerville on Monday morning; the bi-monthly workshop in Cameron Park on Thursday, and Poets and Writers of the Sierra Foothills on Sunday, featuring Wendy Patrice Williams and Jennifer O’Neill Pickering plus open mic. 

 

And click on Medusa's UPCOMING NORCAL EVENTS (http://medusaskitchen.blogspot.com/p/wtf.html) for details about these and other future poetry events in the NorCal area—and keep an eye on this link and on the Kitchen for happenings that might pop up during the week.

And now it’s time for…  


FORM FIDDLERS’ FRIDAY!   

It’s time for more contributions from Form Fiddlers, in addition to those sent to us by Taylor Graham! Each Friday, there will be poems posted here from our readers using forms—either ones which were sent to Medusa during the previous week, or whatever else floats through the Kitchen and the perpetually stoned mind of Medusa. If these instructions are vague, it's because they're meant to be. Just fiddle around with some challenges—  Whaddaya got to lose… ? If you send ‘em, I’ll post ‘em! (See Medusa’s Form Finder at the end of this post for resources and for links to poetry terms used in today’s post.)


There’s also a page at the top of Medusa’s Kitchen called, “FORMS! OMG!!!” which expresses some of my (take ‘em or leave 'em) opinions about the use of forms in poetry writing, as well as listing some more resources to help you navigate through Form Quicksand. Got any more resources to add to our list? Send them to kathykieth@hotmail.com for the benefit of all man/woman/poetkind!

 

* * *

 

 

 Last Week’s Ekphrastic Photo 

We received responses to last week’s Ekphrastic photo from Nolcha Fox, Joe Nolan and Stephen Kingsnorth:


RED LIGHTS
—Nolcha Fox, Buffalo, WY

Red lights should mean it’s time to stop,
but I make an exception
when owl’s eyes glow red, it means
it’s time to herd the doggies in.

* * *

RED-EYED OWL
—Joe Nolan, Stockton, CA

Red-eyed owl,
Color,
Wise and bright,
Ready for a
Silent flight,
Ears so sharp,
So tight!

Talons outstretched forth
To seize a rodent,
As though with fork,
To be
Its nighttime meal.

Poor little morsel!
He never had a chance
Once the owl
Heard him dance
Across some crusty leaves.

* * *

THE EYES HAVE IT
—Stephen Kingsnorth, Coedpoeth, Wrexham, Wales

As night time preyers, bow low show,
but feather light in silent flight,
whose stoop, such swoop so known too late,
both cloak and dagger, glide, claw grip,
talon talent, airlift away.

Its target beams to bullseye, seen
in tunnel vision funnelled through,
though black, ringed bright, all seeing eye,
aerial hunter, overview,
trails, tails quail, tales of woe betides.

So, if yours, ornithology,
facts pocket book, a species’ guide,
with call, size, wing span, noted marks,
here maybe, colour of the eyes,
a highlight midst remarkable.

Or daily sound in Parliament,
as members voted on the Bill,
‘The Ayes have it’, from Speaker’s Chair;
while Owls, by way of ‘Narnia’,
itself of Chaucer, Foules’ debate.

Now suspend sounds-like, ‘like it’ counts,
shoo, hiss Lewis, curse Geoffrey’s verse,
their provenance of parliaments.
But watch pre-talkies, silver screen,
the movie: owl’s out, prey about.

* * *

And here are two Ars Poeticae from Stephen Kingsnorth. Both talk about our ambivalence about our writings and about submitting our writing out into the world, “for fear of nakedness revealed”:

 

 

 

 

 

EKPHRASTIC (SUB)
—Stephen Kingsnorth

The image posted, challenge, dare;
I’ll not respond, five dollars spare?
With chance of publication nil—
more than six hundred sent as well.
But despite ‘No’ in bold black font,
it tempts, that testing image laid,
and I must scribe, in words respond,
to translate picture into verse.
And so I’ve written, challenge filed—
it’s better than I linger, hold,
but to submit, five dollar bill—
plus credit card transaction fee?
I’ll pass on this—though what a waste,
as now the closing date is near.
So I, resistance failed, give up;
press button, lines are on their way.
Submission, knock out, all the same,
as recognise, beyond control.

 

 

 

FIG LEAVES
—Stephen Kingsnorth

A gallery, an open mic,
the sculpture garden—all afford
a means to stare and hear inside
echoes, from prompts displayed around.
The art of listening so framed,
are we too quick, set tongue to speak?
Our insecurity in love,
in being worth, intended whole,
suggests we disagree with grace,
read others’ tone and violence
our sole defence, our soul response,
for fear of nakedness revealed.

____________________

Many thanks to our SnakePals for their brave fiddling! Would you like to be a SnakePal? All you have to do is send poetry—forms or not—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!

____________________

TRIPLE-F CHALLENGES!  

See what you can make of these challenge, and send it/them to kathykieth@hotmail.com! (No deadline.) Let’s try tan Anachronism:

•••Anachronism: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/learn/glossary-terms/anachronism#:~:text=Glossary%20of%20Poetic%20Terms&text=Someone%20or%20something%20placed%20in,when%20the%20play%20is%20set.

•••AND/OR a poem using the Anaphora:

•••Anaphora: https://literarydevices.net/anaphora

•••See also the bottom of this post for another challenge, this one an Ekphrastic photo.

•••And don’t forget each Tuesday’s Seed of the Week! This week it’s “Rendezvous”.

____________________

MEDUSA’S FORM FINDER: Links to poetry terms mentioned today:

•••Alphabet Poetry: https://www.writersdigest.com/personal-updates/alphabet-poetry-or-going-back-to-school
•••Anachronism: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/learn/glossary-terms/anachronism#:~:text=Glossary%20of%20Poetic%20Terms&text=Someone%20or%20something%20placed%20in,when%20the%20play%20is%20set.
•••Anaphora: https://literarydevices.net/anaphora
•••Ars Poetica: www.poetryfoundation.org/learn/glossary-terms/ars-poetica
•••Ekphrastic Poem: notesofoak.com/discover-literature/ekphrastic-poetry 
•••Gwawdodyn Hir: https://www.writersdigest.com/poetic-asides/gwawdodyn-hir-poetic-forms

•••Haibun: www.writersdigest.com/write-better-poetry/haibun-poems-poetic-form
•••Normative Syllabics: hellopoetry.com/collection/108/normative-syllabic-free-verse AND/OR lewisturco.typepad.com/poetics/normative-syllabic-verse
•••Small Ghazal (Joyce Odam): Example poem above, “Small Ghazal”, varies the form, using short couplets (as per the poem’s title).
•••Stevenson: https://poetscollective.org/poetryforms/the-stevenson

____________________

—Medusa

 

 

 

 

 Today's Ekphrastic Challenge!
 
 Make what you can of today's
photo, and send your poetic results to
kathykieth@hotmail.com/. (No deadline.)

* * *

—Photo Courtesy of Public Domain

 
 
 
 

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.

 

  LittleSnake’s Glimmer of Hope
(A cookie from the Kitchen for today):

big brown eyes:
high-chair baby surveys
the noisy restaurant