Minstrels Often Made

Don and Elsie Feliz at their wedding, 1960

CUPID, I HATE THEE
—Michael Drayton

Cupid, I hate thee, which I'd have thee know,
A naked starveling ever may'st thou be,
Poor rogue, go pawn thy fascia and thy bow,
For some few rags wherewith to cover thee;
Or if thou'lt not, thy archery forbear,
To some base rustic do thyself prefer,
And when corn's sown, or grown into the ear,
Practice thy quiver and turn crow-keeper;
Or being blind (as fittest for the trade),
Go hire thyself some bungling harper's boy;
They that are blind are minstrels often made,
So may'st thou live, to thy fair mother's joy:
That whilst with Mars she holdeth her old way,
Thou, her blind son, may'st sit by them, and play.

__________________

Good morning and Happy Valentine's Day! The Snake had a massive celebration of Love last night with the release of To Berlin With Love from Elsie Whitlow Feliz and Don Feliz, a new broadside from Carlena Wike (Going The Distance), a short reading from Ann Wehrman's broadside (Notes From The Ivory Tower), wine from the Friths, and a new SnakeRings SpiralChap from Sam and Kathy Kieth (Sex—For Animals...). It was glorious, and a great way to emerge from hibernation! All of these publications are now at The Book Collector and will soon be available on the rattlesnakepress.com website, as well.


Snake deadline looms!

Deadline for Issue #17 of Rattlesnake Review (due out in mid-March) is this coming Friday, February 15 (postmarked). Send 3-5 poems, plus photos, art, and other poet-phernalia to kathykieth@hotmail.com or P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726. No cover or bio needed, but no simultaneous submissions or previously-published work, please. Issue #16 is still available for free at The Book Collector, or send me two bux and I'll mail you one.


Tonight in NorCal poetry:

•••Thursday (2/14), 7:30 PM: Writers of the New Sun/Los Escritores del Nuevo Sol present: Love, Lyrical Love, their Annual Valentine’s event, this year featuring Manuel Pickett, Music & Words, and special guest poet Fernando Castro. La Raza Galeria Posada, 1022 22th Street, MidTown Sacramento. Cost: $5.00 or as you can afford. All are invited. For Escritores poetry information, contact Graciela Ramirez at 916-456-5323 or http://escritoresdelnuevosol.com/. Take your Valentine to a poetry reading! How romantic!! [Note address correction from last Monday's post. La Raza Galeria Posada is on 22nd St., not 24th.]

•••Also tonight, 8 PM: Poetry Unplugged at Luna's Cafe, 1414 16th St., Sacramento. Open mic before and after.

__________________

IF I WERE LOVED, AS I DESIRE TO BE
—Alfred, Lord Tennyson

If I were loved, as I desire to be,
What is there in this great sphere of earth,
And range of evil between death and birth,
That I should fear,—if I were loved by thee?
All the inner, all the outer world of pain
Clear love would pierce and cleave, if thou wert mine,
As I have heard that, somewhere in the main,
Fresh-water springs come up through bitter brine.
'Twere joy, not fear, clasped hand in hand with thee,
To wit for death—mute—careless of all ills,
Apart upon a mountain, though the surge
Of some new deluge from a thousand hills
Flung leagues of roaring foam into the gorge
Below us, as far on as eye could see.

___________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their POETRY, PHOTOS and ART, as well as announcements of Northern California poetry events, to kathykieth@hotmail.com (or snail ‘em to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726) for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets. Previously-published poems are okay for Medusa’s Kitchen, as long as you own the rights. (Please cite publication.) Medusa cannot vouch for the moral fiber of other publications, contests, etc. that she lists, however, so submit to them at your own risk. For more info about the Snake Empire, including guidelines for submitting to or obtaining our publications, click on the link to the right of this column: Rattlesnake Press (rattlesnakepress.com).

One Human Family

PRAISE
—Wendy Patrice Williams, Citrus Heights

Within one hour:
a buck, a coyote, a doe,
horses, cats,
praying mantises, ticks, spiders;

a yellow-beaked magpie,
feathers of white,
black, and Prussian blue;

children’s laughter—
four girls straddling a log;

a brown tree frog, black line
tracing its lip, sitting waist deep
in fountain water;

and pigeons silent and still—
dark shapes against the golden field
like women in chador
praying at noon.

___________________

Thanks, Wendy! This Saturday (2/16), the Foxes will be out in full force for One Human Family: Poems for a Changing World, a reading by Red Fox Underground Poets Taylor Graham, Irene Lipshin, Moira Magneson, Brigit Truex, Kate Wells, and Wendy Patrice Williams (all of whom are current or about-to-be rattlechappers!) at The Cozmic Cafe, 594 Main St., Placerville. Info: 530-642-8481. Sponsored by El Dorado Peace & Justice in the Season for Nonviolence.

Also at The Cozmic Cafe: Vietnam Today: Carrying On, an exhibition of photographs by Irene Lipshin and Janis Arnell. The reception will be held beginning at 5:30 PM on Feb. 16, then the Red Fox reading begins at 8. The photographs will be on display from Feb. 3 to March 31.

About the Foxes:

Irene Lipshin spends summers traveling and reconfirming her belief that we share the human story of loss and gain, personal, political and global, throughout the world. Her work has appeared in Rattlesnake Review (as well as a chapbook, Shadowlines from Rattlesnake Press, 2006, and a littlesnake broadside); in Poetica, Chaparral Updrafts, the anthologies, We Beg to Differ and Outcry: American Voices of Conscience, Post 9/11 and on the Poets Against the War and Voices in Wartime websites, as well as other publications. This is her second exhibition of photographs at The Cozmic Cafe.

Moira Magneson lives in Placerville and teaches English composition at Sacramento City College. Most recently her work has appeared in Runes, Hanging Loose, Flint Hills Review, and Rattlesnake Review (including a littlesnake broadside), and she has a chapbook coming from Rattlesnake Press next fall.

Taylor Graham trains her dogs for search and rescue. Her poems have appeared in The Iowa Review, Southern Humanities Review, and elsewhere. She’s included in the anthology California Poetry: From the Gold Rush to the Present. Her latest chapbook is Among Neighbors (Rattlesnake Press, 2007). Current project is Walking with Elihu, poems on the American peace activist Elihu Burritt, the Learned Blacksmith.

Brigit Truex is of Native American (Cree/Abenaki), French Canadian and Irish heritage. Born and raised in Washington DC, she has found communities of writers (or started them herself) while living in Massachusetts, Maryland, and California. Publications include Rattlesnake Review, Manzanita, Folio, PDQ, Poetry Now as well as anthologies: Sacramento: 100 Poems, Nantucket, and Small Town USA. She has four chapbooks: Satuit Seasons, Of A Feather, Leaf by Leaf, and A Counterpane Without (Rattlesnake Press, 2007). When not writing, she can mostly be found dancing Northern Traditional at various powwows.

Wendy Patrice Williams teaches English at the College of Alameda. Her poems appear in The Acorn, Little Town, USA, Rattlesnake Review (including a littlesnake broadside), Song of the San Joaquin, PDQ, and the El Dorado Peace and Justice Community Newsletter. Her short stories are published in 13th Moon, Shore Stories: An Anthology of the Jersey Shore, and Whatever It Takes: Women on Women’s Sport. She has a chapbook coming next fall from Rattlesnake Press and is also currently working on a book of creative nonfiction, The Autobiography of a Sea Creature.

After receiving a degree in Anthropology, Kate Wells moved to California to become a raft guide. Seven professions later, she now teaches high school English and lives along the South Fork of the American River where she writes and shares a house with two cats, one dog, two bearded dragons, two children, one husband and four fish. She has a littlesnake broadside and a chapbook, Spiral, published in 2007 by Rattlesnake Press.


Submit!

The Poetry Society of America and The Times Square Alliance are sponsoring a contest: "Bright Lights Big Verse: Poems of Times Square". The submission deadline is March 1. Here's the web address: http://www.poetrysociety.org/bright.php/. If you haven't already been to it, the Poetry Society of America has a great website: www.poetrysociety.org/.

___________________

RSVP
—Moira Magneson, Placerville

Forgive me for not responding until now,
but I would like to pause for a moment to acknowledge
your act of kindness: your aerial distribution of leaflets
warning the villagers to flee—the elders so deft with their canes,
the wounded in their swift wheelchairs, and the families
with little children and pets—who knows what they’re up to—
their belongings crushed into suitcases and wagons.
It’s so good of you to consider them before you drop the bombs.
I’m sure they’re grateful as they exodus en masse
along the rubbled highways. And thankful too
for the border closures on all sides so they can be rounded up,
herded to exactly where you want them. After all,
this is their lament, centuries old—this is their home,
and home, as you know so well, is where the heart is.
So forgive me for not responding sooner, but given
these circumstances, I am speechless.


(First appeared in Margie)

__________________

STRAWBERRIES
—Brigit Truex, Placerville

Whose brown hand chose this fruit,
sized to fit between
thumb and finger, gently,
secreted close to the mounded earth,
beneath layers of serrated green,
the swollen bud-end of a plain
white flower turned
blood-red in the heat, the accumulated
color of bending over
and over below a ripe sun?

And what is the reward, the dizzy
rush of standing upright at the end
of the row, at the end of the day,
a respite, a lull, of letting muscle
and tendon go slack,

while I reach willingly, freely,
into a clean white bowl, to choose
one plump polished berry with its
finely dimpled skin, heady with
the essence of leisure, a sweet surfeit
on the tongue, juice on the chin,
time to savor it?


(First appeared in Atlanta Review)

__________________

Thanks, gals! Today's poetry is from the new Red Fox Underground broadside, One Human Family.

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their POETRY, PHOTOS and ART, as well as announcements of Northern California poetry events, to kathykieth@hotmail.com (or snail ‘em to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726) for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets. Previously-published poems are okay for Medusa’s Kitchen, as long as you own the rights. (Please cite publication.) Medusa cannot vouch for the moral fiber of other publications, contests, etc. that she lists, however, so submit to them at your own risk. For more info about the Snake Empire, including guidelines for submitting to or obtaining our publications, click on the link to the right of this column: Rattlesnake Press (rattlesnakepress.com).

SnakeWatch: News from Rattlesnake Press

•••Tonight (Wednesday, 2/13), 7:30 PM: Rattlesnake Press will roar to life again after winter hibernation, with a new SnakeRings SpiralChap from Don and Elsie Feliz entitled To Berlin With Love, about their adventures in Germany during the building of the Berlin Wall. Also released that evening will be a new littlesnake broadside from Carlena Wike (Going the Distance). In addition, Ann Wehrman, who gave us December’s littlesnake broadside, Notes From The Ivory Tower, but who was unable to read from it at December’s rattle-read, will be there.

Unfortunately, Volume 2 of Conversations, B.L. Kennedy's Rattlesnake Interview Series, won't be ready in time. Nevertheless, you REALLY don’t want to miss this grand Valentine’s return of the Snake! Join us at The Book Collector, 100 24th St. (between J and K) in Sacramento on Weds., February 13 at 7:30 PM. Refreshments and a read-around will follow; bring your own poems or somebody else's. February is Love Month!

•••Deadline for Issue #17 of Rattlesnake Review (due out in mid-March) is this coming Friday, February 15 (postmarked). Send 3-5 poems, plus photos, art, and other poet-phernalia to kathykieth@hotmail.com or P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726. No cover or bio needed, but no simultaneous submissions or previously-published work, please. Issue #16 is still available for free at The Book Collector, or send me two bux and I'll mail you one. Or pick one up when you're at the reading on Wednesday.

Still To Be Named

THE TREE
—John Haines

Tree of my life,
you have grown slowly
in the shadows of giants.

Through darkness and solitude
you stretch year by year
toward that strange, clear light
in which the sky is hidden.

In the quiet grain of your
thoughts the inner life
of the forest stirs
like a secret still to be named.

____________________

THE SECOND TREE
—John Haines

You have told us your story,
and our faces
have turned away.

Was it only the rustling
of tiny finches, who came,
full of desire, to feed
among your thoughts?

Or was it the sun,
whose yellow hands
moved shadow and light
in the spaces?

The unfolded flags
of your spirit fall,
from the brown lips
of a listening child
comes an exhausted sigh.

__________________

THE STONE HARP
—John Haines

A road deepening in the north,
strung with steel,
resonant in the winter evening,
as though the earth were a harp
soon to be struck.

As if a spade
rang in a rock chamber:

in the subterranean light,
glittering with mica,
a figure like a tree turning to stone
stands on its charred roots
and tries to sing.

Now there is all this blood
flowing into the west,
ragged holes at the waterline of the sun—
that ship is sinking.

And the only poet is the wind,
a drifter
who walked in from the coast
with empty pockets.

He stands on the road
at evening, making a sound
like a stone harp
strummed
by a handful of leaves...

____________________

SLEEP
—John Haines

Whether we fall asleep under the moon
like gypsies, with silver coins
in our pockets, or crawl deep
into a cave through which the warm,
furry bats go grinning and flying,
or put on a great black coat
and simply ride away into the darkness,

we become at last like trees
who stand within themselves, thinking.

And when we awake—if we do—
we come back bringing the images
of a lonely childhood: the hands
we held, the threads we unwound
from the shadows beneath us;
and sounds as of voices in another room
where some part of our life
was being prepared—near which we lay,
waiting for our life to begin.

___________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their POETRY, PHOTOS and ART, as well as announcements of Northern California poetry events, to kathykieth@hotmail.com (or snail ‘em to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726) for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets. Previously-published poems are okay for Medusa’s Kitchen, as long as you own the rights. (Please cite publication.) Medusa cannot vouch for the moral fiber of other publications, contests, etc. that she lists, however, so submit to them at your own risk. For more info about the Snake Empire, including guidelines for submitting to or obtaining our publications, click on the link to the right of this column: Rattlesnake Press (rattlesnakepress.com).

SnakeWatch: News from Rattlesnake Press

•••Wednesday (2/13), 7:30 PM: Rattlesnake Press will roar to life again after winter hibernation, with a new SnakeRings SpiralChap from Don and Elsie Feliz entitled To Berlin With Love, about their adventures in Germany during the building of the Berlin Wall. Also released that evening will be a new littlesnake broadside from Carlena Wike (Going the Distance). In addition, Ann Wehrman, who gave us December’s littlesnake broadside, Notes From The Ivory Tower, but who was unable to read from it at December’s rattle-read, will be there as well.

But that’s not all!! In addition to the above, another of our area’s fun couples will be handing out a free special publication, and a third set of Sacramento’s sweethearts will be bringing wine…

Unfortunately, Volume 2 of Conversations, B.L. Kennedy's Rattlesnake Interview Series, won't be ready in time. Nevertheless, you REALLY don’t want to miss this grand Valentine’s return of the Snake! Join us at The Book Collector, 100 24th St. (between J and K) in Sacramento on Weds., February 13 at 7:30 PM. Refreshments and a read-around will follow; bring your own poems or somebody else's. February is Love Month!

•••Deadline for Issue #17 of Rattlesnake Review (due out in mid-March) is this coming Friday, February 15 (postmarked). Send 3-5 poems, plus photos, art, and other poet-phernalia to kathykieth@hotmail.com or P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726. No cover or bio needed, but no simultaneous submissions or previously-published work, please. Issue #16 is still available for free at The Book Collector, or send me two bux and I'll mail you one. Or pick one up when you're at the reading on Wednesday.

Is There Anything More Romantic Than Poetry??

Mount St. Helens, when she blew

POMPEII & HERCULANEUM
—David Humphreys, Stockton

It is pleasant here beside the fountain,
surrounding garden green with figs and
grapes. The fresco painter adjusts his
scaffold just a few streets away. The
baker’s horse is harnessed to the mill
stone grinding flour and this August
afternoon is warm for a wedding in toga
gold brocaded linen.

Pompeii is buried now by pumice and
ash, roofs collapsing beneath twenty feet
of volcanic debris, substrata for future
excavation. Now, the time for Herculaneum
and its pyroclastic flows. Take this brief
moment to look around you. What is it
that you see? Do you see perhaps another
pair of gleaming eyes wet with pulsing wonder?

___________________

Thanks, David!

This week in NorCal poetry:

•••Tonight (Monday, 2/11), 7:30 PM: Sacramento Poetry Center presents Alice Anderson and Patrick Grizzell at Time Tested Books, 1114 21st St., Sacramento. Open mic will follow. Note temporary location.

•••Wednesday (2/13), 7:30 PM: Rattlesnake Press will roar to life again after winter hibernation, with a new SnakeRings SpiralChap from Don and Elsie Feliz entitled To Berlin With Love, about their adventures in Germany during the building of the Berlin Wall. Also released that evening will be a new littlesnake broadside from Carlena Wike (Going the Distance). In addition, Ann Wehrman, who gave us December’s littlesnake broadside, Notes From The Ivory Tower, but who was unable to read from it at December’s rattle-read, will be there as well.

But that’s not all!! In addition to the above, another of our area’s fun couples will be handing out a free special publication, and a third set of Sacramento’s sweethearts will be bringing wine…

Unfortunately, Volume 2 of Conversations, B.L. Kennedy's Rattlesnake Interview Series, won't be ready in time. Nevertheless, you REALLY don’t want to miss this grand Valentine’s return of the Snake! Join us at The Book Collector, 100 24th St. (between J and K) in Sacramento on Weds., February 13 at 7:30 PM. Refreshments and a read-around will follow; bring your own poems or somebody else's. February is Love Month! And speaking of love...

•••Thursday (2/14), 7:30 PM: Writers of the New Sun/Los Escritores del Nuevo Sol present: Love, Lyrical Love, their Annual Valentine’s event, this year featuring Manuel Pickett, Music & Words, and special guest poet Fernando Castro. La Raza Galeria Posada, 1022 24th Street, MidTown Sacramento. Cost: $5.00 or as you can afford. All are invited. For Escritores poetry information, contact Graciela Ramirez at 916-456-5323 or http://escritoresdelnuevosol.com/. Take your Valentine to a poetry reading! How romantic!!

•••Friday (2/15), 7-8 PM: Our House Poetry Reading at El Dorado Dance Academy. Featured readers are Anthony Perciado and Joaquin Fioresi. An open mike follows. There is no charge. The Academy is located at 3921 Sandstone Dr. Suite 4, El Dorado Hills. From Hwy 50, go south on Latrobe Rd past the signals at White Rock Rd, Golden Foothill Pkwy, and Suncast Ln. The next signal is Golden Foothill Pkwy (yes, again — it's a loop). Turn right, follow Golden Foothill around a curve; make a left on Sandstone and go to the dead-end. Park in the parking lot on the right.

•••Deadline for Issue #17 of Rattlesnake Review (due out in mid-March) is this coming Friday, February 15 (postmarked). Send 3-5 poems, plus photos, art, and other poet-phernalia to kathykieth@hotmail.com or P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726. No cover or bio needed, but no simultaneous submissions or previously-published work, please. Issue #16 is still available for free at The Book Collector, or send me two bux and I'll mail you one. Or pick one up when you're at the reading on Wednesday.

•••February 15 is also the deadline for this year’s Sacramento Poetry Center contest. This year's entry fee is $4 per poem. First, second and third prizes will be awarded [$100, $50, $25]. In addition, 10 honorable mentions will receive $10 gift certificates. Please send two copies of each poem, one with your name and contact info, another without any identifying information on it. No restrictions on length, subject or style. Judging will be done by a suitably notable area poet whom SPC will announce [in other words, a poet to be named later]. Send poems to: Sacramento Poetry Center Poetry Contest, The Sacramento Poetry Center, 1719 25th St., Sacramento, CA 95816.

•••Saturday (2/16), One Human Family: Poems for a Changing World, a reading by Red Fox Underground Poets Taylor Graham, Irene Lipshin, Moira Magneson, Brigit Truex, Kate Wells, and Wendy Patrice Williams (all of whom are current or about-to-be rattlechappers!) at The Cozmic Cafe, 594 Main St., Placerville. Info: 530-642-8481. Sponsored by El Dorado Peace & Justice in the Season for Nonviolence.

Also at The Cozmic Cafe: Vietnam Today: Carrying On, an exhibition of photographs by Irene Lipshin and Janis Arnell. The reception will be held beginning at 5:30 PM on Feb. 16, then the Red Fox reading begins at 8. The photographs will be on display from Feb. 3 to March 31.

•••Also Saturday (2/16), 7 PM: SpiralChappers Joseph and Susan Finkleman read at Underground Books, 2814 35th St (at Broadway) in Sacramento. $3.00.

__________________

JUSTICE IN THE VILLAGE SQUARE
—David Humphreys

He has just seen eight ads in the New York Times
on pages 2 and 3, top left a pair of Chanel earrings,
middle of the page a Cartier watch to the lower left Gucci
of a woman’s shoe. Next to this, same page, a Coach
hand bag and a Clifford Michael ad for a midwinter
sale on mink furs. On the opposite page Tiffany & Co.
up top, Saks Fifth Avenue and Bloomingdales below.
When he first left school he worked at a Conoco station
for $5 an hour and then later worked as a carpenter. Now,
he watches the homeless pushing grocery carts around town,
aluminum cans in black plastic garbage bags as they dream
the quite real dreams of nothing in particular and he begins
to build guillotines in the splash and gathering red pool of a
distant collective memory and torch-lit imagination.

_________________

THE SECRET MEANING OF LIFE
—David Humphreys

The meaning of life for this great man
was to shine light into every dark corner
having ground the edges of a mirror
found at the scene of a terrible accident
of war. This morning moment is however,
filled with maple sunlit colors
with a perfect pair of new pink roses,
lovely fall season smile.

(This poem was a finalist in Stockton's 55-word contest.)

___________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their POETRY, PHOTOS and ART, as well as announcements of Northern California poetry events, to kathykieth@hotmail.com (or snail ‘em to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726) for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets. Previously-published poems are okay for Medusa’s Kitchen, as long as you own the rights. (Please cite publication.) Medusa cannot vouch for the moral fiber of other publications, contests, etc. that she lists, however, so submit to them at your own risk. For more info about the Snake Empire, including guidelines for submitting to or obtaining our publications, click on the link to the right of this column: Rattlesnake Press (rattlesnakepress.com).

Heading Home Again

WILD GEESE
—Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting—
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

__________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their POETRY, PHOTOS and ART, as well as announcements of Northern California poetry events, to kathykieth@hotmail.com (or snail ‘em to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726) for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets. Previously-published poems are okay for Medusa’s Kitchen, as long as you own the rights. (Please cite publication.) Medusa cannot vouch for the moral fiber of other publications, contests, etc. that she lists, however, so submit to them at your own risk. For more info about the Snake Empire, including guidelines for submitting to or obtaining our publications, click on the link to the right of this column: Rattlesnake Press (rattlesnakepress.com).

Rumpelstiltskin Dreams

FIELD NOTES — THREE A.M.
—Carlene Wike, Elk Grove

Some Rumpelstiltskin dream
has urged me out of bed
to spin darkness into words.

Held only by my own cold arms
I shiver under stars—
wait for night to speak.

In this quiet chill,
silence whispers—
grass grows restless,
trees rustle without wind.
I share an uneasy solitude
with unseen creatures.

Some thoughts are lost in sunlight—
this sense of passing through;
that resurrection is a carbon thing.

When night becomes a fever in me
my soul will abandon these footsteps—
feather the quivering grass

sweep over barrow and swale
hawking life.

___________________

Thanks, Carlena! Join us this coming Weds., February 13, for the release of Carlena Wike's littlesnake broadside from Rattlesnake Press, Going the Distance, at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sacramento, 7:30 PM.

•••Monday (2/11), 7:30 PM: Sacramento Poetry Center presents Allice Anderson and Patrick Grizzell at Time Tested Books, 1114 21st St., Sacramento [note temporary location]. Open mic will follow. Alice Anderson's first collection of poetry, Human Nature, won the Elmer Holmes Bobst Prize for Literature from NYU and the Great Lakes Colleges Association's Best First Book Prize. She holds An MFA in poetry from Sarah Lawrence College. Her poems appear widely in journals such as New York Quarterly and New Letters and are included in the anthologies, On the Verge: Poets and Artists in America, and American Poetry: The Next Generation. Her noted poem, "The Split" (included in almost twenty anthologies to date), will be included in the 20th Anniversary Edition of The Courage To Heal. She lives and writes in Sacramento, California, having returned home after escaping the deep-water bayou hell of post-Katrina Gulf Coast Mississippi. (See more at myspace.com/herkind.)

Patrick Grizzell's books include Dark Music, Chicken Months (about which Robert Bly wrote: "... the poems have a sweet spontaneity and tenderness."), and, with painter Jimi Suzuki, a chapbook of sumi paintings and poetry entitled Minotaure Into Night. He has a new book in manuscript entitled Writing In Place. He is a founding member and previous director of the Sacramento Poetry Center. He has been published in numerous literary presses and anthologies in the U.S., Italy, Japan, and the U.K. He performs poetry and music solo and with his band, Junkyard Burlesque. He has performed with, among others, Allen Ginsberg, Leon Redbone, Robert Creeley and Anne Waldman. John Lee Hooker once said that he "sound pretty good" on the dobro. (See more at: myspace.com/patrickgrizzell). Pat will present a few of his songs on Monday night in addition to his poetry.

__________________

COCOON
—Carlena Wike

I am spinning silken thoughts
around my homespun days
and I have quit old pleasures
to cast an iinward gaze
across old larval duty
beyong the empty hour—
and now I would give up the leaf
to emulate the flower.

__________________

WORDSTORM
—Carlena Wike

At first, a drizzle of words
then a steady patter
and finally a downpour—
a rush of gutteral phrases
as images gather, run off,
flood plain speech.

Heavy with metaphor
lines begin to seep
through cracks
in the roof of my soul.
I rush for paper—
sop up the poems
puddled in my head.

___________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their POETRY, PHOTOS and ART, as well as announcements of Northern California poetry events, to kathykieth@hotmail.com (or snail ‘em to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726) for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets. Previously-published poems are okay for Medusa’s Kitchen, as long as you own the rights. (Please cite publication.) Medusa cannot vouch for the moral fiber of other publications, contests, etc. that she lists, however, so submit to them at your own risk. For more info about the Snake Empire, including guidelines for submitting to or obtaining our publications, click on the link to the right of this column: Rattlesnake Press (rattlesnakepress.com).

Like Hearts

Elizabeth Bishop

THE ARMADILLO
(for Robert Lowell)
—Elizabeth Bishop

This is the time of year
when almost every night
the frail, illegal fire balloons appear.
Climbing the mountain height,

rising toward a saint
still honored in these parts,
the paper chambers flush and fill with light
that comes and goes, like hearts.

Once up against the sky it's hard
to tell them from the stars—
planets, that is—the tinted ones:
Venus going down, or Mars,

or the pale green one. With a wind,
they flare and falter, wobble and toss;
but if it's still they steer between
the kite sticks of the Southern Cross,

receding, dwindling, solemnly
and steadily forsaking us,
or, in the downdraft from a peak,
suddenly turning dangerous.

Last night another big one fell.
It splattered like an egg of fire
against the cliff behind the house.
The flame ran down. We saw the pair

of owls who nest there flying up
and up, their whirling black-and-white
stained bright pink underneath, until
they shrieked up out of sight.

The ancient owls' nest must have burned.
Hastily, all alone,
a glistening armadillo left the scene,
rose-flecked, head down, tail down,

and then a baby rabbit jumped out,
short-eared, to our surprise.
So soft!—a handful of intangible ash
with fixed, ignited eyes.

Too pretty, dreamlike mimicry!
O falling fire and piercing cry
and panic, and a weak mailed fist
clenched ignorant against the sky!

___________________

Today, Elizabeth Bishop would've been 97 years old. Hear her read this poem on Poets.org/.

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their POETRY, PHOTOS and ART, as well as announcements of Northern California poetry events, to kathykieth@hotmail.com (or snail ‘em to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726) for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets. Previously-published poems are okay for Medusa’s Kitchen, as long as you own the rights. (Please cite publication.) Medusa cannot vouch for the moral fiber of other publications, contests, etc. that she lists, however, so submit to them at your own risk. For more info about the Snake Empire, including guidelines for submitting to or obtaining our publications, click on the link to the right of this column: Rattlesnake Press (rattlesnakepress.com).