Seductive Woman, Seductive Cat

—Photo by Katy Brown, Davis

WHAT IF
—Claire J. Baker, Pinole

What if the sky's
prehistoric dome
crumbles,
the sun exploding
rivers of lava over
the four directions...

What if a few survivors
find on a pristine island
the sky reborn, the sun
healed, the air like silk,
flora and fauna abundant—

love and kindness,
the only languages spoken.

__________________

JUNGLE CATS
—Claire J. Baker

A sultry woman
curls around her cat
her passion purring
to purring cat.

Clenching his throb
to her breast
she digs fingers
deep into fur
enters a jungle
tiger eyes burning.

Curled on purple couch
seductive woman
seductive cat.

__________________

AN OLD ILLUSTRATED DICTIONARY
—Claire J. Baker

Now, years later, I wonder
what happened to the tall
Polynesian beauty who wore
hibiscus in long black hair,
a halter &; a flowered lava-lava?
Tropical Mona Lisa by the sea
leaning against a palm tree
as if against an altar.

On the next page, handsome
Lawrence of Arabia resembles her,
except a lava flow had begun
to harden in his eyes.
A caftan clings to shoulders
firm as pounded sand.

He looks thirsty, wary,
half sunstruck.

Moonrise Over Buttes

—Photo by Katy Brown

UNDER A FULL MOON
—Marie J. Ross, Stockton


Under a full moon,


we looked at stars


Held hands


In ambiance of mood


As we kissed 



Ocean was humming 


Romantic song 


Singing to the sparkle 


We watched 


Our eyes roaming the onyx



This was momentous 


A challenge to our emotions,
To evade the question


You and I forever


Or ocean's song forever blinking?



___________________

FILLING THE UNIVERSE

—Marie J. Ross

There were enough reasons in the world


to run


escape the blasts


sirens


bodies in the street,


Freedom 


Freedom the reason



There were enough reasons in the world


To dry a child’s eyes


of pain’s frequency,


Hold weary hands,


administer miracle elixir’s


Humanness


And healing the reason, 



There were enough reasons in the world


To plant on fertile soils long stems of grain


Dig ditches  


for water’s life expanding longevity,


Find places of calm for spiritual retreat


Survival


Survival the reason.



There are enough reasons in the world:


Enough scientific minds,


Enough courage and love of country,


Enough soul and spirit to fill the universe.


__________________

CRIME SCENE

—Nancy Haskett, Modesto

Early this morning
there was a murder in our house
downstairs—

witnessed by no one—
but the evidence was scattered throughout several rooms
filled, now, with feathers
like tiny gray petals
strewn across tile and carpet,
so soft and weightless
that my slippered footsteps
or small gasps of horror
send them airborne
once more,
floating for a few seconds
across the silent kitchen

no sound but the refrigerator,
humming and purring
contentedly,

like

the

cat.

Artie

—Photo by Michelle Kunert, Sacramento

NEGOTIABLE INSECURITIES
—Caschwa, Sacramento

The fear trade has
never been bigger
even after explorers proved
you don't just sail over
the edge

they have taken fear
and packaged it in
pills, insurance policies,
personal protection devices,
whatever

some luscious-looking fruits
are poison that will kill you
temptation is the tool of the devil
so one must not eat, breathe, or
form opinions

death can sneak up on you
like a poetic epiphany
welcome and totally at home
in your sanctuary
of fear

the penalties are severe
for lying under oath
and they have ways
to catch you lying
before you speak

when you take off your shoes
at night to go to bed
a spirit resides there
retracing your itinerary
looking for missteps

if it doesn't find any
it will manufacture some
because above all
there must be a product
to market

__________________

RIGHT THERE
—Caschwa

When someone earnestly
tells you that it is not hard
to find a 4-letter word for
difficult

they have slipped the answer
behind a negative
to elude, to tease
on purpose

you didn't expect it to be
nicely giftwrapped
with a name tag
did you?

tired of waiting and waiting
in line at the grocery store
customers ahead with issues,
register out of tape

eggs bagged first
cans on top
just get on with it
can't wait any longer

delays, postponements
eyes fixed on positive outcomes
can't wait any longer
we have ignition

__________________

FAUX SLEEP
—Caschwa

spent the night
tossing and turning
ideas in my head
like a blender

I felt needed like
a galleon needs rowers
people to whip
land to reach

issues abounded
each with phony salesmen
pushing snakeoil elixirs
the better mousetrap

on television
actors read scripted opinions
about other people's opinions
all alleged to be fact

makeup! makeup!
your bias is showing
old unfaithful farts
preaching family values

shown again and again
because the viewing
audience sees the ads
driven by ratings

witnesses sit
at the witness stand
forced to recite an oath
don't trust any of 'em

not time to get up yet
and start a new day
of same ol', same ol'
freeway traffic

chariot races
out to kill
winner take all
no rules of the road

home sweet home
bed, pillows, quiet
peaceful slumber
blender on high

___________________

Today's LittleNip:

TABULA RASA
—Caschwa

A blank slate has been
a very good thing ever since
the time of Aristotle
so I made it so

now what is all that fuss
about a complex theorem
that was cluttering
up the board?

__________________

—Medusa

—Photo by Katy Brown

Joyeux Anniversaire!

Pastor Randall Pollard Trilobite

—Photo by Michelle Kunert, Sacramento
 

WHO SPEAKS FOR US

(To honor Kathy Kieth
on her birthday Feb. 6)
—B.Z. Niditch, Brookline, MA

In our envisioning
of words in our worlds
which rattle us
to awaken love
from all troubled despairs,
as we ease up
from own solitary voice
and express
our circled laughter
even tears beside memory
turning down
the covers
of each unique bed rock
by fresh cut ferns
covering our gardens
to rock with our own space
expect black swans
for a transient sunny day
a good Word has a friend
and guide on watch
by poetry tables
of our best angels.

____________________

GERTRUDE STEIN'S DAWN

—B.Z. Niditch
 

In Paris


a student 
from the Left bank


beyond time


kicks a soccer ball


down an alley way


without money


rings you up


no answer


from the occupation


of a Sapphic poet


in middle earth


somewhere in Apt.#2


spaced by parentheses


putting a last rose


transformed


in a sylvan vase


by correspondences


also unanswered.

____________________

SIMONE WEIL'S SEARCH
—B.Z. Niditch

Sunlight visibly
found you
Simone Weil
through your search
ruminating for
an incarnate answer
with questions,
eyes blinding brim
with a monastic ear
to hear from silence.

___________________

WINTER FORECAST

—Lynn M. Hansen, Modesto

When lengthy winter nights begin to wane
And thoughts of Spring seep in our sleepy brain
We look to Punxsutawny Phil to show
And tell us how much longer we’ll have snow.

If the day is bright with sun he sees his
Shadow, and six more weeks of winter is
Predicted then, or so the legend goes,
With more bad weather and continued cold.

Without the sun a shadow he can’t see
And means that Spring is surely soon to be.
I don’t know why we need a weather man,
Each February Phil will make his scan.

So if the forecast seems a bit severe
Like forty years of endless winter near

Just turn your skeptic eye toward Gobbler’s Knob
Get a well known professional snow job.
 

Day Six

3D Collage by Sandra Yarbrough

—Photo by Michelle Kunert
 

THE BOOKSTORE CAT
—Taylor Graham, Placerville

Where has he gone, wanton as a silver
prince on this dull day? The shopkeeper's
cat, the one called Pasha, one of an older
generation of cats, with courtesy but
courtly scorn. Not at all like the kitten
dubbed Spare Change, who bats an action-
hero about like a filmmaker changing
scripts. She waits at the counter as if
forgetting what book she wanted. Pasha
will come, attended by nothing but
a few more sultry hours of afternoon.

____________________

WOMAN WITH CAT
—Taylor Graham

Here she sits. No easy chair; this new place
is empty space. Not home. Where
is Percy? House-mice beware

the tom of muted-golden fur. Asleep,
he'd keep watch with silken purr,
dreaming all the mice that were.

Percy's jaws a velvet trap, shut now. Dead.
Alive in her head—catnap,
yellow tabby in her lap.

____________________

HEADLIGHTS IN FOG
—Taylor Graham

Not really fog, this ground mist that lies dense
in hollows, fence-wire thin, twist
of road—I'm a soloist

steering into an unknown symphony.
One woodwind tree flutes alone
morning music's muffled tone.

___________________

Thanks to today's poets and shutterbug Michelle Kunert (I think it's appropriate to post prehistoric pix on the day of my birth...) BZ has decided to commemorate the birthdays of three famous poets and one more lowly (me—thanxxx, BZ!); Lynn Hansen marks Ground Hog Day; and TG came up with a SOW (Woman With a Cat) and two Forms to Fiddle With despite the bustle of bringing husband Hatch home from the hospital. (Poetry is the most important thing, of course!) About Stein and Weil BZ writes: Two brilliant writers, Gertrude Stein and Simone Weil who lived in France, celebrate their birthday Feb. 3. Joyeux Anniversaire!
 

___________________

Today's LittleNip:

JAMES JOYCE 

(b-day 2/2)
—B.Z. Niditch

I tried to hear Gaelic
waiting for an Irish bread
at a picnic,
I wish a language
once so alive
would rise from the dead.

__________________

—Medusa, with a link in case you missed Phil's forecast: www.nydailynews.com/news/national/groundhog-day-punxsutawney-phil-predicts-early-spring-article-1.1253756

 Michelle Kunert

Cats, Cats, Cats... and a Dog

   Woman with a Cat (1921)  

by Fernand Léger, 1881-1955

WOMAN WITH CAT
(After Woman with a Cat by Fernand Léger)

… presented in rounds of light
to elaborate her
against perception
which is faulty and smug
as a critic’s—
she is never absolute, as she
would have it. She holds
her secrets
in an open book,
but tells her cat anything—
her cat, a holder of secrets
and loyal as
a love—
at least, the thought of that.
She wears a look of blankness
when you stare too deep
too forceful    too intense,
demanding of her what you
want to know
that is so captivating:
not her beauty,
that is not the subject here,
but how she burrows into you
from such a far place as silence.

____________________

THE CUBISTIC WOMAN
(After Femme Aux Raisins, 1917 by Jean Metzinger)

She turns this way and that to feel herself turning,
to watch the expressions of light upon her.

The room keeps her secrets.
The chair is an incident of reason.

She confesses only to the bird-headed jug
on the table beside her—how attentively

it listens—how the empty glass inquires.
She moves slightly and the room

changes its whole perspective.
Her thoughts are made of moods.

The bird and the glass conspire
to intoxicate her. She is a warm glow

in a room of designing shadows.
She loves the separations of her mind—

how golden she becomes with each shift
of her body—how motion and stillness

work in harmony to perfect her. For what
impressive mirror does she prove her beauty?

DISGUISES

There she is again, my mother, showing up
in somebody else’s photos or poems,

somebody else’s life that sounds like mine.
How does she do that and remain my own?

This time she has on her white dress and
summer hat. That’s me by her side—

held close to her.  She dotes on me.
And I am awkward. Shy. Not pretty like her.

Sometimes she pretends not to know me—
glancing away at a particular moment.

But I know that’s just one of her secrets
that she keeps from me.

Her eyes always give one flick of recognition.

___________________

MY MOTHER OF SECRETS

Danger followed us, I am sure.
Why else would I fear all secrets,
all telling, all revision of facts:

the where, the who, the when,
the what of questions?

Why else would I trust the
peripheral—the off-key—
the slant of words,
trust instinct over anything?

___________________

YOUR PRESENCE

I reel
To your presence.

You are a long sorrow
Lengthening even as I
Mention this.

You are spreading
over my entirety.
I am helpless under your
shadow.

You have such a wide
wing,
cold and forever.

How come I nuzzle
against you and weep
like a lost child
to a lost mother?

THE EYES   

The way they follow you about,
watch how you move,
tell secrets on you;

ghosts of yourself
that live in every corner;
walls that speak to you

doors . . .
            mirrors . . .
                      the very rooms . . .
the eyes . . .

___________________

SLEEP MOTEL

Here is the map to nowhere. If you must go there, follow carefully the marked way. When night comes to your need to rest, the little towns you pass will sleep behind their simple names. All windows will be dark as if night were the end to everything. There is a place you can stay that has one vacancy—it always has. The next day’s travel will not hurry you. This is timeless country. Sleep is made of night sky, black and bottomless. You can stay on if you want to.

(first pub. in Parting Gifts, 2001)                                             
 
___________________

THE ATTRACTION

There is more to this than love, they claim:    
there is the intrigue, what they use                  
to solve each other, let each other in               
where all the dark secrets lurk—the dark                
afraid of the light.                                            

To solve each other, let each other in             
where all the dark secrets lurk—the dark       
afraid of the light—                                        
there is more to this than love, they claim:   
there is the intrigue—what they use.   

Our thanks to Joyce Odam for today's poems and pix—all of which she did, except, of course, for the Léger painting at the top which Joyce has used as inspiration for her first poem. Let's take her cue and use that for our Seed of the Week: Woman With a Cat. We won't be the first ones to do that, though; if you go to bjws.blogspot.com/search?q=leger+woman+with+a+cat you'll see multiferous art musings on that subject. Send us your cat-words at kathykieth@hotmail.com

Joyce's LittleNip today is in the form of an Englyn Penfyr. Don't be scared by either the name or the fact that it's a form; it's actually pretty easy. Check out www.poetrybase.info/forms/001/113.shtml for the "form"-ula and give it a shot. Forms, not even the Welsh ones, will bite... I was not aware of that site, I don't think, and it has a huge listing of forms. Cool.

May I remind you that Poetry Out Loud will be happening both in Sacramento County and El Dorado County tomorrow—see the article on the green board at the right of this for details.

___________________

Today's LittleNip:

TRANSGRESSIONS  

Now that I am very old—without tears—
in these years I cannot hold
are secrets I have not told.

Though some memories burn deep and still flare,
I wear them like scars, and keep
those secrets—sowings I reap.

___________________

—Medusa

Today's post is full of cats, cats, cats, 

including the SOW. Dogs will have their due, though: 

Hatch Graham has been in the hospital, and Taylor 

sent us this photo of Cowboy waiting for him. 

She writes: I thought you might like to see how 

Cowboy spends his days waiting in the Kaiser

 parking garage for Hatch, sleeping with his head 

under Hatch's wool jacket...

Pandling, Sad and Sweet

Robert Lee Haycock, Antioch

LOST

The operator took pity and let him board without paying at Market
"Don't bother the other passengers."
He found his way to the back of the bus where I sat all alone
And he stank and he grimaced and twitched
He sat opposite me and said "How ya doin'?"
"Good," I said, "and you?"
"Good," and mumbled something about sleeping at the beach
And he stank and he grimaced and twitched
"Is this the Number 5?"
"I nodded," thanking Creator that my own boy was home in bed
This young man could have been my son
And he stank and he grimaced and twitched
I could have moved but he wanted companionship
That was all I had to offer
No food, no scarf, no money in my bag
And he stank and he grimaced and twitched
He reached out and touched my knee
He waved when I looked up from reading
I waved back at him
And he stank and he grimaced and twitched
I rang the bell and got off at 10th Avenue
He got off there too, 40 blocks from the beach
He is lost and so am I

______________________

MARKET STREET, 6:30 am

No shoes
Shuffles toward me
Eyes rolling
Cadges a smoke
Hands dirtier than
Hands can possibly be
Startles at my lighter
As if I had slapped him
Wanders away
Cigarette unlit

A Blur

BREATHE

Nobody nearby was awake to see the neighborhood idiot standing bathrobed in his driveway gaping at the night.

The Sisters saw him.  Europa's Bull saw him.  Zeus saw him.  The Blind Hunter and Leda's Sons saw him there. 

Flags of cloud unfurled toward sunrise.  No more stars would fall.  He turned to the front door of his little house under the sky.

Just then a piece of Mr. Halley's wanderer rocketed into the sea of air overhead.  Ice dissolved in flame.

It made him smile to think that he would breathe it in and out someday along with the breath of Jesus and da Vinci and many another fool.

_____________________

SAD AND SWEET

Woken from my heading-home dozing
Just outside of Orinda station
By a swarthy young man and a
Red, white and green accordion
His lady friend passing the cup
I smiled and slept again
Music moved up the train
Operator came on the P.A.
"Loud music and panhandling
(She pronounced it 'pandling')
Is not allowed on BART"
"But they're busking," thought I
"'Pandling' is not allowed on BART"
The melody was sad and sweet

Fellow Travelers

PERHAPS

Perhaps we would live differently if
Instead of Washington, Lincoln, Hamilton
Our legal tender bore the faces of
That woman huddling under cardboard in
The doorway on Market St. yesterday
That addict shaking his way home from
The methadone clinic on the #31 bus today
That neighbor quietly digging through
The curbside recycling before dawn tomorrow

Tell us therefore, What thinkest thou? Is it lawful to give tribute unto Caesar, or not?

But Jesus perceived their wickedness, and said, Why tempt ye me, ye hypocrites?

Shew me the tribute money. And they brought unto him a penny.

And he saith unto them, Whose is this image and superscription?

They say unto him, Caesar's. Then saith he unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's; and unto God the things that are God's.

(Matthew 22: 17-21, King James Version)

_____________________

THE BARKER

I call him The Barker.  He stands most mornings at Market and Montgomery yapping incoherent monosyllables at passing traffic.  He approached me before dawn today while I waited for the #5 Fulton.

"Won't money ye?"
"Pardon?"
"Wall mounted see?"
"One more time?"

I stared at his swollen tongue, his snaggled teeth, his cracked lips.  I was trying to understand as he tried again.

"One monk easy?"
"This is October."
"Ahhh, Octove. Wuzza dade?"
"This is the fourteenth of October."
"Four teens. Sank you."

There but for the grace of God go you and I.

de Young daybreak

Today's LittleNip(s):

A BETTER MAN

Humiliated
It made me a better man
To know I was not


SEARCHING

Steeple top neon cross
God's radar round and round
Searching for the faintest
Echoes of forgiveness


THE BIRDS ARE FED

For the pigeons, bread
Sister, sidewalk sleeper, starves
But the birds are fed


RICH MAN

Hot water faucets
Make me a rich man wanting
For nothing at all

SING

A song without words
Though it hurts when I hear you
Please sing it again

_____________________

Our thanks to Robert Lee Haycock for today's poems and pix! About himself, Robert writes:
In 1956, I was born in Inglewood, California, delivered by the same GP, Dr. Fate, who delivered my Mom. I have Welsh ancestors on both Mom and Dad's sides and credit this curious race for my love of language, song and myth. I grew up in Santa Clara and San Jose when they were still part of "The Valley of Heart's Delight" rather than "The Silicon Valley." I studied Art at Santa Clara University, the oldest operating institution of higher learning in California. Since 1988 I have worked for the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco where I am Principal Technician in the Exhibitions Department at the M.H. de Young Museum (established in 1894) and the California Palace of the Legion of Honor (dedicated in 1924.) Antioch, Gateway to the Delta, is where I have resided with my beloved family since 1994. For more, see bobbyleehaycock.blogspot.com 

_____________________

—Medusa

Enough

Joy Boys

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

WE LEAVE YOU PLEASURE
—Kenneth Patchen
 
We leave you pleasure in the earth:
Burnt grass in the sun; waters'
Body, lovely in the waste of years,
Having no wings for us;
The stellar vast wonder in the sky; the furniture
Of Space shattered within the heart;
The cynical image of smoke curling up
From homes we never had.

We leave you seas upon parched shores;
The iron twist in vines
Over our graves: the deafening sound
Of silence over everything.
Turn from the rebel body: here;
The crude question of the grass;
The spirit's face bleary
With sightlessness. It is enough.
We leave you.

______________________

—Medusa

All Is In The Telling

Sunset, September 2

THE DAY

So small, the day, standing slightly
Bow-legged, hand on its collection
Of hours, a goofy grin on its face.
I walk with you down a street
Bright with all the tea in China.
There is wild music in the signs and colors.
There are perfect clouds a-roil above.
The buildings giving everything a just-
Washed look, like the way your eyes do.
And sun, leaning into the street,
Scattering the cars before it comes
Swooping into your face.  I cannot
Tell it from you or you from it.
Here it seems as if every day looks
This way.  We watch it hitch its
Thumbs in its belt and follow
It from bookstore to school yard
As if it really could go on into tomorrow.

_______________________

LIVING IN A CITY ABANDONED BY TIME                     

The roads dying even as people use them.
It has become impossible to identify the season.
We cannot find flowing water.
Names become barely useful.
There are winds.  Some are able to see them.
We must read bird songs.
The dogs are the same dogs we have always seen.

We have never heard the sound of bells.
These are the same stars we have always known.
Glass will not break.

It has not always been this way.
We have been allowed to keep our shadows.
They are useless to us.  They have other
Things to do.

Door keys fit every lock.
Now we are waiting.  We are taking time.
We are reaching toward it every day.
We are hoping we will be able to die.
We have to meet time again and to
Find eternity in the same café as time.

_____________________

THE BEING

I can’t look past the green.
It pours like a spilling fog
From my heart and races to find
A voice for me before my mind engages.

I find myself full of reflections, echoes
That have no point of generation,
Without a timelessness coupled
To its black bull pulling past all danger.
No beginning.  No end.  Who rules here?

Questions wear centuries for raiments.
We can see the pillars that hold

The sky and find ourselves able only
To discuss the architecture of the place.

I look out across the plain.
There are beautiful horses there,
More beautiful than any I have ever seen.
We keep vigil on the edges of the wasteland.
We hear of things that may be real.
I listen for the oars of the Argus
In this mirror of a sea, this round
Of days pressed down into an
Eleatic prism that expands and contracts
As our lungs do, moment by moment.

I feel we remain motionless
Before things that cannot be, but are.

Later in the day, in a clearing, a few
Words come to me that can no longer
Live without real footsteps dragging
Them back to real meaning.

I look at them for a very long time,
Gather them to me, as if they were arrows,
Press them to my chest and bury them
Within a great tree to await
Another such moment.

______________________

THE MAKING

I have been all opened up
In the caves that line the seas.
They are unknown to most of the world.

A song from the kestrel helps me to know
Where I am and sheds an incomparable
Light that shows the secret parts of mystery
As I am so opened up.

I will find others here to be sure.
The shadows will show them
As gods who kindled our days upon
The earth as I sit rapt knowing that
My body too is earth once more
And I too am to become no more
Than memory shunting through labyrinths,
When words are the rain and nighttime
Glowers at the precious shapes of forgetting.

We will know that we eat of defeat,
That we eat of humiliation,
That we eat of treachery,
But will still use our years up
As traces that mark the way
For others as we watch this same bird
Lead us to a night where we will be
Used up completely to complete a single poem.

In the Rigging

IN THE RIGGING: TEARS BEGAN TO FALL

We were near Cinfuego waiting for pirates.
We had been there for over two hundred years.
The stars had migrated and had chosen
Other places they wanted to visit.
We have been here previously. We had
Seen the constellations form and reform
Many times.  We have been to other worlds;
It was indeed the sea that carried us there.

They had propped the king in a corner
But he had been there so long
He looked like a pile of sticks
With some bits of cloth.

Sometimes the sea would turn
Bright yellow as if the light
Came from within, the wave
Tops glowing.  At other times
Even in the night, the entire
Sea was a violet as if rubbed
To a burnish and then the next
Moment, opal, perfect opal.

We would take to the high
Rigging to see this.  It was the sea.
They had me on gallants working all
The way to the Moonraker.

Sometimes men seemed to be
Walking in the surface of the water.
They were not ghosts.  They were men.

We lived in rooms filled with sand.
The tide came in blistering the sand.
We were above the wave line among
The lemon trees.  The sands looked black.
The water sounded pleasing.  The king
Surely would return from that pile of sticks.

Surely he would return.  These seas shall
Remain unknown forever, mysterious and clear.
The clock weaving in and out of what we choose
To call dreams only because we are
Old and cannot but be the dreamer.
It seems a fair, fair wind follows.
A clear water indeed.  We know no longing.
We are captured by the History of
The Night Borges spoke of, our eyes
Still scanning the horizon, should there
Be a place where we might land.

____________________

SEA SYMPHONY

Scraped along the bottom of the sea,
Little tents of sand, recurring again
And again until there was a village
Of them, then a town, then a city,
And we were walking among them,

Trailing the great paths of the sea turtles,
Beacons to the vast schools of fish
Seeking a way to that perfect sound
That directs them in their dances,

To be herded by sharks and whales,
Pushing them closer and closer that they
May disappear into larger fish as black
Holes absorb all energy.

We see only the tops of waves
Sparkle and quiver as thousands of fish
Go down as a symphony
The sea plays with its creatures.  

____________________

THE RUNNING PLACE

All I see magnifies my life.
It moves, a damaged tapestry,
Telling of all events, fire in the
Mouth of cloth.  It looks like
Bayeux with its dead across
The bottom of the scroll, decapitated
And staring at the horses rampant
In the clear light of a cold day.

            *

After we passed the Ortner house
The tall board fence of the junkyard
Ran up almost all the way to Hyde
Park Boulevard.  It was our cemetery.
Dead cars, scrap iron and black.
Nothing would leave there.  Just as
Nothing would leave our part of town.

Now the pages have all become unreadable,
All error and all truth are crammed
Into a short walk, into a single volume
The past blindsides us with
When we think we have some fondness
Left for a childhood that barely spoke
With hope, that contained an afternoon
That would not be like the rest of them.

The boys dying, sputtering out, while I
Thought of ivory with its smooth feel,
Of its belonging to a body.

There should be tapestries of these boys.
They should speak of resurrection
From the likes of Saint Paul Street,
Louisiana Avenue, Pretoria
Street, remembered as if they were
The pyramid at Giza or the
Labyrinth in the floor of Notre
Dame.  But no, these boys are nothing.

No voice comes to them to lift them
Over the cemetery fence to a cacophony
Made of smashed automobiles and
The smell of old petroleum and fuel.

They are doomed to walk forever
In the greasy twilight of our neighborhood,

Slipping into an open garage, to watch
Coronado red paint cover a night
Filled with such longing it fills the air
With lacquer, as it struggles to become
Perfect in the poem, precise as light.

 

___________________
 
THE STORIES

I believe very little of what is said here,
But there are those here who have
Seen things I may never know,
And so, I come to these meetings
High on the cliffs and listen
To the stories these men tell.

And in September they light
Multi-colored lamps
In front of the tents and
The tales begin to collect the end of
The year to themselves.

The air smells of hay and the night
Becomes crisp.  We drink a cup
Of the warm crab soup and listen
Far into the night.

The weather gathers over the sea.
The moon comes now and again
To listen and watch the lovely
Dogs stretch out near the fire,
Close their eyes and keep the hours
With us.  The harp strings open the night
Enough for us to once again be
Thankful for the stars and a
Guiding wind.  The season unrolls upon us.

We have come to believe many things
By the time the morning brings
Some warmth back to us,
Opening the day for awhile as we
Move along the high cliffs.

We are all stories, each, and all
Is in the telling.
 

_____________________

Today's LittleNip:

COLLECTING THE NIGHT

Unexpectedly I walk out in the rain.
I had no idea this was going on.
It is so beautiful I try to think of something more so.
All I can think of is you.  I hurry back into the house,
Get back in bed with you.  You are asleep.  I am
Not.  When I close my eyes I imagine you are the rain.
When I join you in sleep I notice we are walking together
In the rain, collecting the night around us, as if it were ours.

____________________

—Medusa, with thanks to D.R. Wagner for today's poems and pix! 

Niagara Falls, where D.R. grew up

Wednesday, Thursday

Tuesday

—Photo by Taylor Graham, Placerville

GHAZAL OF THE CYANIDE ALMOND
—Jane Blue, Sacramento

The little cyanide almond exposed inside the peach.
The teakettle whimpering instead of whistling.

The pain of last week is gone. An earthquake has rattled Tokyo.
Someone is mowing, always mowing, slashing the street with their noise.

Before I was twenty I had no memories, knitting them together for later.
Dragonflies circle and tilt away like helicopters.

Or cutting trees, murdering trees, with that hoarse, slicing sound.
Last night a panther poured itself through an upper window in a house on a hill.

I lay on a big bed with a former lover, light slanting in like water.
You say your life is narrow, that there is no adventure in it.

A red geranium peeks from behind the sycamore.
Overheard on a television ad: “You can own a new solar system.”

A black honeybee comes to my pen, drawn by the smell of ink?
One memory grows out of another, like a plant from a seed.

(first pub. in Poetry Breakfast)

___________________

FIAT
(After Li-Young Lee)

—Jane Blue

Dreamed a rill that became a torrent.

Dreamed a woman who was my mother
but not my mother.

Dreamed St. Catherine’s severed head in Siena,
trees bright against the haze,
the Palio a bowl bared of its tumbling horses,
the bright pennants and clamor of bettors.

Dreamed a fiat, let it be done.

Dreamed the stream purring under our bedroom in Vermont.
Dreamed a perfect sleep.

Dreamed a woman and a man dancing in a pyre,
so I could resurrect him,
so I could remember the spark.

So I could go in and out of the twelve houses
of the sun, the twelve houses of the moon.

And the man was not you; we lived in an alternate world,
and no one knew, not even you.

Dreamed the blue stars and the blue moon and the blue leaves.

Dreamed the world as a film
you can pass through like a ghost
and back into your life, inevitably altered.

Dreamed him. Dreamed you.

(first pub. in FutureCycle)

___________________

WHO IS THE BEAR?
—Jane Blue

He has grown too menacing for friendship.
He watches men in the woods
and women in their pantries.
He has no way to speak to them
but he wants something.
He lumbers into their houses. He tries
out a church, breaking the handle from
the church hall door. He goes to a table
and eats 22 jars of peanut butter
to be packed off to the poor. He is the poor.
The lids fall apart in his claws. He has
no idea how strong he is. He sniffs
and slurps. No one is there to see
his bad manners. He walks to the kitchen
and opens the refrigerator the usual way,
pushing the handle, releasing the sweet
odor of oranges. He punctures
a dozen cans of concentrate, licking
the cardboard, as easy for him
as raking a hive of honey. He swipes
a few sweet rolls, then leaves,
damaging little except his own wild
heart. The pastor asks his flock to pray
for the bear. Pray for him to stop ravishing
their homes, be caught and returned
to a paradise that no longer exists.
The wilderness has abandoned the bear.
He is alone and hungry.
He no longer knows what he is hungry for.

(first pub. in Women Artists Date Book 2013)

____________________

THORNY ROSE AND JACK-O'LANTERN
—Jane Blue

The smell of a dryer sheet in the air.
A female jay hunting spiders
in the cobwebbed roses. A white plastic bag
limps across the street in the wind
like a sick cat; then lies down in the gutter
and dies. Assignment: draw your pain. Draw
a thorny rose out of a Jack-O’Lantern head.
I scare myself with that flat, in-holding mouth.
Rose blooms, pain blooms. Jack-O’Lantern
rots, frightening the children. A “dark demon,”
my sister says. A jay squawks. I’ve got to get to it:
Mike’s dying. Thirty-seven years old. Addicts
are not what you think. They can be gentle people,
people in mourning. His father died when he was ten.
His mother never gave up. Wrote his obituary.

Wednesday (with mother Rosy)

—Photo by Taylor Graham

JUST BORN
—Taylor Graham, Placerville

I peek in at daybreak to see
what's left over from the night.
A newborn child. A boy,
another son. What prospects for him
in this world? Part black, part
white, mostly dirty brown, the birth
drying. Outside, I shiver for January
cold. Frost covers everything,
the sun's a smudge
through unlaundered cloud.
But it's the sun. Our earth rides
balanced on its spin.

____________________

ISLANDER
—Taylor Graham

The neon “I” is out
at the SLANDER MOTEL.
I imagine dented fenders, and litter
in the gutters. But the other sign
says VACANCY.
I imagine curtains parting
without a face looking out; or
someone crying behind a dead-
bolt lock. Don't ask
what passes in a rented dark.
The Islander's shut its one
blind I.


(an earlier version of this poem appeared in Nerve Cowboy, 2001)

___________________

NO TELL MO-TEL
—Michael Cluff, Corona

This is the locale
that would make
the Bates Hotel
appear to be a heaven on earth;
for here, the paws of rabbits
are used to curdle soup
composed of follicles
and formica chips.
The toilets flush
upward
imposing jet propulsion
on idling sitters
the alligators live in corroded tubs
while nitre flows easily
on the barely audible
swamp coolers
of Southern renown.
And deals are made
by deluded demigods
that paralyze local constabularies
into ennui
and rapid fire assaults
on the guilty as well
as the innocent
while men in three-piece suits
red silk ties
and yellowing socks
yodel their onanistic pleasures
to a lifeless, mewing sky.

_____________________
 

BUT THE NEON SIGNS WERE GREAT
—Kevin Jones, Elk Grove

Just across the river,
And just before Davenport
Began, was the Tall Corn
Motel.  Old, weedy and
Faded, I always thought
It would be a great place
For a no-strings fling.
But English majors
Hang out with English
Majors, even if they
Don’t disport with them,
And I could never entice
Anyone to sin with me in a place
With (Yes, it was coming)
Such a corny name.
Except maybe once. But
A small circus had just
Pulled in and a baby
Elephant was grazing
The parking lot.  Nothing
Spoils the mood like
A baby elephant in
The parking lot.

_____________________

Today's LittleNip:

ANOTHER NO TELL MO-TEL
—Michael Cluff

The place I learn
a few negatives
about sex
timing
and the use
of evocative lighting
red reinforcing red
organic paralleling fluorescent
in raunchy roundelays
I remember
until
the shotgun
was finally
hidden away.

_____________________

Monday's child is fair of face,
Tuesday's child is full of grace,
Wednesday's child is full of woe,
Thursday's child has far to go,
Friday's child is loving and giving,
Saturday's child works hard for his living,
And the child that is born on the Sabbath day
Is bonny and blithe, and good and gay.

Yes, Taylor Graham and hubby Hatch have three new lambs: Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, so it seems like the nursery rhyme was called for. (See Monday, Jan. 21's post for Thursday's photo.) Here, by the way, is a nursery rhyme trivia quiz: www.rhymes.org.uk/nursery-rhyme-trivia-quiz.htm

Which day of the week were YOU born on?

_____________________

—Medusa

Wednesday's Child and Mom

—Photo by Taylor Graham