Still Ticking

—Poems by Michael Ceraolo, S. Euclid, OH

—Anonymous Winter Photos

A BELATED, THREE-QUARTER-HEARTED APOLOGY

It was sometime
during my senior year of high school,
either late 1975
or early 1976,
I don't remember which,
                                    though
I do remember wearing a winter coat
when heading there
My French IV class went one evening
to one of the local colleges,
John Carroll University,
whose French Department was staging
a production of Racine's Phedre
(Phaedra for those opposed to French)

In one of the climactic moments
in Act V,
              the heroine kneels down,
puts her ear to the supine hero's chest,
and makes a dramatic utterance
in French alexandrines
                                    From those
who either weren't strong in French
or weren't familiar with the play
in English translation,
                                came the whispered
What did she say?
What did she say?

                               And I,
keeping in mind the ubiquity
of John Cameron Swayze's
Timex watch commercials,
                                        said
It's still ticking

At least six rows of the audience
erupted in laughter at my remark,
and though neither of the actors
onstage was a professional,
they were unfazed by laughter
at a moment in the production
calling for the opposite response;
they continued on the finish
without missing a best,
and then took their bows to a round
of well-deserved applause

Forty-plus years later,
I would like to apologize,
                                     and
perhaps satisfy their curiosity
as to what prompted the laughter

CLEVELAND HAIKU #523

Frozen winter moon—
seventeen below zero
on my fifth birthday

* * *

CLEVELAND HAIKU #524

Prolonged spring fever—
weather doesn't coincide
with the calendar

* * *

CLEVELAND HAIKU #526

Fishing spot—
discarded lures wound around
an electric wire

2077 CAMPUS ROAD

It is near the boundary of two watersheds,
a little ways down the road
from Notre Dame College,
                                       and
it's a little bit boxier
than the rest of the surrounding houses
But when it was built in 1932
it was not merely distinctive,
it was pioneering:
                            the first
one of its kind built anywhere

The Ferro Corporation,
first incorporated in 1919
as the Ferro Enamel Corporation,
decided in the depths of the Great Depression
to build an experimental model home
at the above address
as a way to showcase other applications
of its relatively new product,
porcelain enamel

(porcelain enamel, aka enameled steel—
a thin coating of glass fused to the metal
at temperatures between 750 and 850 degrees Celsius—
1,380 to 1,560 degrees Fahrenheit)

The house was designed by
local architect Charles Bacon Rowley
(designer of
the Shaker Heights Public Library,
the Mayfield Country Club,
the Clifton Club,
                         and
several schools and other houses locally
as well as three halls at Kenyon College
and buildings in Cape Cod;
some are gone, some remain)

With a steel frame,
and the porcelain enamel used as siding,
it had two main selling points:
it was fireproof,
                       and
the exterior never needed painting
A similar design would be used
the next year for a house at Chicago's
Century of Progress Expo,
                                       and
porcelain enamel was a major component
in the prefabricated Lustron homes
built after World War II

Today, without trespassing
I can't tell if the porcelain enamel
is still in place; I find out later
it has been covered with vinyl siding
(because of rust?),
one of the many changes one might expect
in a house over eighty years old

There is, as of yet,
no historical marker on the site

Today’s LittleNip:

The discipline of writing something down is the first step toward making it happen.

—Lee Iococca

_____________________

—Medusa, with thanks to Michael Ceraolo for his fine poetry today!

 —Anonymous Photo
Celebrate poetry!

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.

The End of Beyond

—Poems and Photos by Taylor Graham, Placerville, CA

ONE WORD GETS ME STARTED

This morning after rain
every footprint’s washed away but
my dog catches scent—something on the wind
or rising from earth—as early sun
strikes wet pavement at a certain angle, mini-
dazzle. Listen! Wild goose is calling
overhead. And here’s a dirt path into woods.
Oak woods, leaves tarnished pewter.
This one old oak, gray wrinkled bark, a wisdom
of acorn-lore. Toyon's heavy with
Christmas-berry.
One step and then another, as one word
leads to the next, a typewritten line I can’t take
back. Life’s paragraph. It takes me
on a winding path that climbs
then branches as a tree might, as a life.
Cloven hoofprint fresh this morning;
all the quick, unseen creatures who live here.
Who knows where a walk, a poem leads?

LOKI’S DREAM

Curiosity or too much energy
for anybody’s good? She’s namesake
of mischief’s god, shape-shifter,
snuggled on the couch this moment;
the next, scouting mice
from pantry to antique desk, never
quite at rest. Her ambition,
to sniff every inch of earth; for what’s
above or underneath the surface;
what’s there now or once has been;
pulling her handler head-
long by the leash. Ambition?
It’s her dream to know the world
and all that’s in it. Just
a dog? An untamed heart.
While humans classify by species, 
color, race, her race has no finish-line.

UNIVERSE WITHIN HER SIGHT

A winding road by sun or moon and star,
by sea-wind, tide, by train or bus or car,
by caravan as homeless travelers go,
she wound up here. A bench. A door ajar.

And still she weaves her ink-strokes tiny, slow
and measured into tales of long ago,
of signs and symbols, wisdom passed along
down generations. Eyes of ancients glow

in hers like rivers weaving land to song,
a landscape parched to desert far too long.
From exile she can see beyond the war
a universe where all things still belong.

SHAKY TREES
    “Resilience” at the Confidence Lab

This living room replicates forest, trunks
of fabric painted to look like trees. Building
has stood 150 years, repairs are needed
in upper floors. Chain across the stairway:
“Don’t even think about it.” Keep out
of dark you can’t see. We stay in the lower,
living room; walk among textile trunks
that waver with our steps, our conversation.
The floor seems steady but fabric trees
take on a living of their own; ghost trees,
breathing as we inhale green.  Do they
mourn the solid trunks that used to grow
here for ages before the place was town’d?
Town still growing, trees on shaky ground.

THE VAULT
    “Resilience: A Living Room”

A venerable pine cone like a sacred hat
in burnished wood-tones on ebony pedestal.

This is where they keep precious things
dormant but alive. Seeds. Fir and pine,

hope for generations of breathing life
like sunlight secrets, safe in a black box,

a lamplight beacon in a dark cabin
in the wilderness; our future.

FOREST LIKE DREAM

From Fairplay the road climbs
into forest, unearthly this almost-winter
morning. A winding road
flanked by spectral pine and cedar,
their constant cool breath hovering in fog.

No other traffic on Mt Aukum Road.
My dog says Stop. I find a wide spot, inhale
the scent of green; think of becoming
woods—December silence
restless in time while my dog

orients her nose-map, then looks back at me.
Time to move along, road cutting
through gray toward the end of beyond,
weaving us into forest as I drive,
forgetting destinations.

Today’s LittleNip:

CABIN
—Taylor Graham

River shaking earth
under mountain dark
and light diffused by cloud mist,
it squats tiny but sturdy.
Its windows have gathered sun.

___________________

Our thanks to Taylor Graham for today’s fine poems and photos as she circles around that cabin in the woods, last week’s ekphrastic Seed of the Week. Her “Confidence Lab” poems were inspired by the "Resilience" installation at El Dorado Arts Council’s new Confidence Lab on Main St. in Placerville.

Tonight there will be three different poetry events in our area, each beginning at 8pm: Poetry Unplugged at Luna’s Cafe, with featured readers and open mic; or The Love Jones “Chill Night” of love poetry at Laughs Unlimited in Old Sac; and Mary Mackey will read at the John Natsoulas Gallery in Davis, 8pm. Scroll down to the blue column (under the green column at the right) for info about these and other upcoming poetry events in our area—and note that more may be added at the last minute.

—Medusa

Beautiful Loki: An Untamed Heart 

—Photo by Katy Brown, Davis, CA
Celebrate poetry!

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.

Luminous Spirits

—Poems by Dah, Berkeley, CA

—Anonymous Photos

THE SPIRITUALITY OF A RAINBOW

The spirituality of a rainbow:
a colorful thought
from universal consciousness
manifesting across the sky.

The living colors of water and light
illuminating in silence,
as if a wisp of innocent beauty
from eternity’s memory,

smearing, stretching, arching,
its raw finish, its vibrant nakedness,
for all of creation to delight in.
I bow to the ephemeral visits

of rainbows,
to their
fleeting impressions
of luminous spirit.

TRIBE OF CREATION

Stillness: at the edge of this meadow,
motionless against air’s clear skin
a luminous red coat’s white-tipped ears
are on the sound of my breathing, with
ancient eyes on the motion my bones make.

An air current streams my human scent
to the fabric of its sensors. I stop
in a space that inserts the intimacy
of our understood curiosity.
I ask nothing more of this divine red fox

than to know my friendship or my eyes
that adore it or my spirit’s dignity in offering
peace from the tribe of creation that we are.
I sit as the fox sits along the countryside
of our ancestors.

In silence: within the instinctive expression
of stillness together we breathe and take in
dawn’s nourishment as if estranged friends
remembering an old friendship
from another lifetime.

THE NIGHT’S BREATH IS MORE LIQUID

The wind kicks up the baked sepia dust, turning it
to a vigorous cloud in low motion over a thirsting ground
mixing its physics into sails of circling yellow leaves and debris.

I walk across the early evening light like Jesus lightly
over the water, my eyes stuck on some distant crow ascending
with its mouth yakking.

The wind tips the bird to the right then to the left
refusing to leave it alone. The air, the scent, the light
emphasizes autumn’s arrangement: the night’s breath is more liquid.

MUCH OLDER NOW

Much older now: I have returned to my soul,
holding earth’s stained skin in my hands.

A great illusion is in front of me,
the sky spreads its moons.

Time is dying yet never stops creating
and destroying life.

I have spoken of perfect hours, the accomplishments of years,
unfaithful silence, a rush of salt from the seas.

In this world the sky is a poet and the whole of life
inhales dawn and dusk—consider this:

Love:
a meeting place upon our mouths.

Loneliness:
a shadow a body no longer wants.

Love:
give me your hand
and feel my breath spilling over.

Harmony:
a hidden sweetness, the sky’s silence,
a piece of love from a finished kiss.

Nocturnal Love:
wildly scented bonfires, shadows
against emptiness, sunlight
held by the moon.

Winter’s Light:
a fresh wound of delicate aromas,
a transformation of air to glittering rain,
a mouth that sings like a banjo.

Under layers of life death rots to its very end:
life has set fire to us, we must burn.

___________________

Today’s LittleNip:

FROM THE HEART OF LOVE
—Dah

I want to drink
from the trees
from the sky
from the clouds
from the eyes of love

I want to drink
from the rivers
from the deserts
from the fog’s drizzle
from the nipples of love

I want to drink
from the body of love
from the heart of love
from love 
I want to drink

_____________________

Many thanks to Dah for this mornings poems! Dah’s seventh poetry collection is Something Else’s Thoughts (Transcendent Zero Press), and his poems have been published by editors from the US, UK, Ireland, Canada, Spain,Singapore, Philippines, Poland, Australia, Africa, and India. He is a Pushcart Prize and Best Of The Net nominee and the lead editor of the poetry critique group, The Lounge. Dah lives in Berkeley, California, where he is working on his eighth book of poetry. Welcome back to the Kitchen, Dah!

Sacramento Poet Mary Mackey and Davis Poet Andy Jones may be heard in conversation on KDVS (90.3 FM) tonight at 5:30pm on Dr. Andy's Poetry and Technology Hour. Scroll down to the blue column (under the green column at the right) for info about this and other upcoming poetry events in our area—and note that more may be added at the last minute.

—Medusa 

 Berkeley Poet Dah

Celebrate Poetry!

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.

My Seven-Minded Horse

Garden Memories

—Poems and Original Artwork by Joyce Odam, Sacramento, CA

TEN

in the sky
like a high
promise made of sunset and
voice of, say God, in His Most

Religious Moment—shining there
like a private illusion, not at all (un)like
some Neon-Cloud Formation
made of pollution dust in a windless sky,

the ocean blazing beneath it
with shimmering red light from the
disappearing sun, and lapping against

the consciousness of everything
even the silhouette of the very earth…
the breathing trees…  the (un)breathing stone
picked up at random and carried in a pocket,

where some divining hand can feel
the comfort of it. Oh, sweet digression,
you have carried me away from

The Number In The Sky
which seemed so vain
with its self-congratulation—and was

so admired by the (un)discerning,
and the envious, like an ad for happiness :
Oh, One;   Oh, Zero;   Oh, Ten.

 Winter Scape

OWNERSHIP

I, with my seven-minded horse,
go through the visions of its eyes.

How high the night
we grip and ride.

Three ears east, we listen.
It is the light.

We make a silhouette
and define ourselves against the sky.

The horse dreams.
I guard its sleep.

Later it tells me :
One innocence. One flaw. One kind forgetfulness.

I am its strength,
it, my direction.

Sometimes we feast
on grass and rain.

The rest is hunger.
We are lean.

My mind is one.
The horse is free.

And always, it turns just before the
fall from where I lead it.

Sometimes we fly,
but only after death.

The rest is sad :
recapture and simple grazing.

 Tremor

WHERE THE RIVER FLOWS

how deep the red sunset water
how steep the blue images of trees
how smoky the sky in the reddened water

how blind the place where the river turns
and you want to turn there
though the blue trees shudder
and the red goes deeper
and the slippery bank is too dark to grasp

but you turn with the water
the redness folds you in
and the clouds continue
and even then you want to grasp at texture


(first pub. in Brevities: A Mini-Mag of
Minimalist Poems, May, 2009)
 
__________________

THE TIMING

It was the red cow under the gray crackle of sky in the
gold field-light—the thundering back of sound—the
soft reverberation into nothing—the slightest movement
that the stillness knew. It was the far-off moment waiting
to be this one. It was the timing.

 Looking in Windows

THE STEEP ROOF

Three levels. High blue sky of blue clouds—
below, two tall trees—nearby, a tall lit house
for night to see—
exaggeratedly built :

square box bottom
red roof
held up
by another
square,
also lit.

The hill is next, rounded in night’s special green,
sloping down to a hidden valley—who lives here
with this sky, these trees, and this beaconed light,
closer to heaven’s own dark mystery,
churning all around, like a scenery . . . .

__________________

THE PERIMETER                            

Late afternoon—
the day’s light turning cold—
two girls in thin white dresses
stand on a high slope facing the
gray and distant winter sea, which,
for the moment, is calm. The girls
seem out of context—like future
beings, or ghosts of some earlier
time—one as the desire of the other—
pondering life and questioning the sea,
which always answers with long, gray
sighings that pull beyond the girls’ 
hearing—standing so still—
leaning forward to listen
—outside the perimeter
of the rickety white fence—
where they seem frozen
except for the sheer,
white movement
of their dresses,
flaking shades of gray
thickening around them
in this capturing moment
that threatens to hold them forever.

 Turning Point

HOLDING THE FUTURE
(Tritina)

Soon they will pleasure to the night and love,
holding the future closer than it is,
yearning that far together with their eyes—

all that they mean and want, hot in their eyes;
all that they give to trust, wild in their love.
What they will learn is what the difference is.

Passion is what the first compulsion is,
and what remains will suffer in their eyes:
infatuation stays in love with love—

and love—before it is—will haunt the eyes.

__________________

HIGH RISE IN THE RAIN

An unfurling of white umbrellas
from a great height of weightlessness
on a day of spent light—moving
like ripples and bouncing the raindrops

over the wet streets. It was a camouflage,
I thought—a great mass of winter souls
in migration followed by a white singing
of birds that were invisible.

I felt my window tremble with joy
at the spectacle as the floor swayed 
and I wondered how so many
floating umbrellas could fit the space

of my watching. My own umbrella
stood dry and folded beside the door
with my keys and things that I needed.
I wanted to be down there among them,

but did not want to give up my view
as the umbrellas kept touching
and parting in their maneuverings—
occasional bits of sidewalk showing through.

The height deepened and left me no time
to decide—the window opened
and the room-light poured through
and my umbrella flew into my hands.

 Barrier

OUR LACK OF WEEPING

Note this craggy waterfall struggling down
the jutted rocks—the land broken—

the one tree barely alive

and the tufts of straggle-grass—
the flat white sky—

and the clumsy way we stumble
over this terrain

as we go
from one word to another

and your eyes are hot,
and mine are cold,

and we have left the even ground
for this—

this terrible moor,
something to get across—

admire even—for its significance,

this trickle of chance
for anything to survive until the rain.

___________________

Today’s LittleNip:

HEROICS
—Joyce Odam

The night
you
leapt
off the roof
into the arms
of some beloved
admirer—you flew
—flew down the dark
into the net—caught.
 
____________________

Many thanks to Joyce Odam for her poems about our Seed of the Week, the little house in the dark woods: its roof, the darkness, the rain... Ekphrastic poetry, as you know, is not just a description of the picture—it's about what the picture evokes. It's okay to talk around the picture. And Joyce notes that the Tritina form (as found in The Bird Catcher by Marie Ponsot) is three stanzas, three lines each, each line ending in one of a set of three words, patterned:

1, 2, 3  /  3, 1, 2  /  2, 3, 2  /  1, 2, 3  

An additional line at the conclusion of the poem contains all of the end words.   

Our new Seed of the Week is Too Rushed For My Own Good. 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.

Poetry Off-the-Shelves meets in El Dorado Hills tonight, 5-7pm, at the library on Silva Valley Parkway. And there’s an addition to our Thursday calendar: Mary Mackey will read from her new book at the John Natsoulas Gallery in Davis (plus open mic), 8pm. Mary and Andy Jones can be heard in conversation on KDVS (90.3FM) this Wednesday night, 5:30pm, on Dr. Andy’s Poetry and Technology Hour. Scroll down to the blue column (under the green column at the right) for info about these and other upcoming poetry events in our area—and note that more may be added at the last minute.

—Medusa

 —Anonymous
Celebrate Poetry—and the art of slowing down!

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.

The Color of the Day

—Photos by Caschwa, Sacramento, CA

THE IMPORTANCE OF FINGERS AND PALMS
—Michael Brownstein, Chicago, IL

They lived on the edge of the graveyard
Their yard lit by spirit light
Their side door always welcoming.
They kept their garden courteous
And they never deceived or angered.
Their home was not rooted in dispute,
Their evening walks samples of simplicity.
They held hands long into their years,
Spoke to few and kept to themselves,
Ate what they grew and ate simply.
We did not know of their death
Until the lights from the edge careened
Outwards, stopping traffic nearby
And causing havoc near the hills.
Their door was wide open, lights
Were in motion, and they were seated
Comfortably on comfortable chairs,
Dinner before them. They must have
Passed away together, hand in hand.
Go past their home now and hold
Your breath. You know they are
Watching and remember—this is important—
If you are with someone you like,
Never walk past their house
Without holding the other’s hand.

TRIOLET* NUMBER 14
—Michael Brownstein
 
Let us rise and shine
and see the color of the day.
dawn is drawn in wine—
let us rise and shine,
enter the Antigua blue design,
find the turquoise water of the bay:
Let us rise and shine
and see the color of the day.

*A 13th-century French poetic form

IDLE TIME AT DUSK
—Joseph Nolan, Stockton, CA

Flipping through another magazine
I see some pretty actresses
As they’ve made the scene,
Showing off some skin
In glamourous dresses,
Sidling their boyfriends.
Later, there’s caresses,
I assume.

Shifting to the cell phone
For the news—
A way to pass the time away,
Escaping doldrums’ blues.

Time spent alone on a train
Coming and going
Thinking things one thinks
When so alone,
Surrounded by so many,
Going home
When it’s getting dark. 

INDIAN SUMMER
—Joseph Nolan

Your place
Looked lovely
In the summer,

When the rain
Washed down
The tree leaves,
Near,

When the heat
Was just
Insane,

And no-one
Ever wandered
Down the street
In pouring rain,

But I loved
Sweet September--
Indian Summer,
Warm and plain,

When it seldom,
If ever,
Rained,

And grass
Went brown
From the
Farmers’ fields,
All the way
Into town.

THE KNOWINGNESS OF ANGELS
—Joseph Nolan

Angels have always known
And they are knowing still,
Strengths and weaknesses
Inside of men,
Things twisted and broken,
Wounds unhealed,
All secrets revealed
In the light of
Twenty-thousand suns
Focused to a single point
Of penetrating light
That shines through skin,
Through bone,
And all within,
In the burning clarity
Of an angel’s eye,
Contrasting you with Eternity,
Your life
And the place you will lie
When your life is done
Angels have always known,
And Angels are knowing,
Still.

They can see the ash
Of things that burned away
Inside a man,
Ground down—
Things lost, released, abandoned.

Angels say,
“Don’t beguile yourself
With manufacturing
Your own internal shadows,
Or confuse yourself
With imagining
The opaque
Might remain so,
Before the brightest light
That pours past every whirling atom
Throughout the day
And even through the night.”

STRANGE DREAMS
—Joseph Nolan

The wise fool
The crazy sage
Rumpelstiltskin laughs,
He wants his fee,
A newborn baby
For his posterity.
How horrible
Contracts can be!

I wake with sandy eyes.
I hear a baby cry
In the next room.
I am so relieved.
Such strange dreams!
Where do they come from? 

I AWOKE
—Caschwa
 
Some would say I was lying, and
others that I was laying, anyways I
was in a bed in ICU, sometime after
10 days in a coma they tell me, with
a full left-leg cast and a big bandage
wrapped several times around my
right thumb

They asked me to wiggle my toes
and were joyously happy that I could

I have zero memory of the fateful
motorcycle crash, and was later
told by some kind of “mental expert”
that if I had actually seen the car hit
me, or witnessed being hurled 45 feet
till I landed head first on the pavement,
that the very trauma of the experience
would likely have blocked that from my
memory

Why, oh why, is that mental protective
feature not working now, when we have
taken the kindergarten class clown and
put him in charge of the White House?

NO COVER
—Caschwa
 
After reading “Cover Design As
A Torn Page” by Joyce Odam,
Medusa’s Kitchen, 11/27/18


Kids today navigate whole
libraries of databases held on
little microchips, built into one
or another pocket device.

No more need at all for those big,
heavy books to look up a fact or
a phone number, no more need
for stone tablets in backpacks.

The open invitation to “correct me
if I’m wrong” has now become a
solo scenario, the quiet, covert
pressing of a few buttons.

Pose with me for a selfie and
then we are done here…
you own the world, right in your
pocket.

CAN’T BEGIN TO KNOW
—Caschwa

EXAMPLE A:

Born to rich parents
who hire the best advisers
to create the right optics
so we look less like misers

“Thoughtful” is measured in
rounded dollars, skip the cents
they are beneath our calling
like loose ladies for the gents

Problems disappear because
we hire strength and grit,
owning land gives us money and
clout…that about settles it.

EXAMPLE B:

Accidents all, no good cards
show up in our deck,
our dream is to rise to living
paycheck to paycheck

A dilapidated derby is our
fancy three-cornered hat,
broken mirrors never lie, and
that about settles that!

ALONE IN A TOWER
—Caschwa

(sung insincerely to the tune of
"Away in a Manger")


Alone in a tower, no wife in the bed 
Petty Tyrant Donald paid a whore, it was said
Media up high recounted each throb 
Petty Tyrant Donald, asleep on the job.

The stories are flowing, The Donald awakes 
Petty Tyrant Donald, no crying he makes
I love me, white hero, he looks in the mirror 
Let’s rest in my tower till morning is here.

Please hear me, white woman, I ask you to stay 
Close by me for awhile, and love what I pay
Hope all the dear white folks in my tender care 
Don’t open that tower to clear the foul air.


PUSHING IT
—Caschwa

This is going to take some imagination
as if you are an envelope, and someone
is going to push you and contort you in
ways that you really didn’t anticipate.

Let’s just ponder the advantages of
replacing our real estate tycoon president
with a truck driver:  big semi, tractor double
trailer, loaded, and consider how much
better off our whole nation would be.

Such a driver would professionally check
the rig to make sure it is trip-ready, not
leaving significant gaps for others to later
find and fix, and negotiate that behemoth
machine along steep, winding, challenging
highways, always keeping focus on the road,
much, much too concerned with precision
maneuvers than to waste any precious time
or energy finding new ways to shame people,
or separate families, or tweet messages
meant only to hurt people.

And for this driver, backing up is something
done artfully to contribute to a healthy stream
of commerce, not as an afterthought to take
back those sharp barbs thrown in hateful tirades. 

Dream on.

____________________

Today’s LittleNip:

DREAMING OF KOALAS
—Joseph Nolan

I dream of marsupials
Clinging to a tree
Eating eucalyptus
They can get for free.

I dream of cute koalas,
Cute as they can be!
Eating eucalyptus,
Clinging to a tree.

What’s all this to me?
It’s only what I dream.
I’m fond of cute koalas
And eucalyptus trees.

_____________________

Our thanks to today’s contributors for today’s poetry and to Caschwa (Carl Schwartz), in addition, for his photos! Poetry events in our area begin tonight at Sac. Poetry Center with readers from the latest issue of American River Review, 7:30pm. On Tuesday, 5-7pm, Poetry Off-the-Shelves will meet at the El Dorado Hills library on Silva Valley Pkwy in El Dorado Hills.

Thursday, in addition to Poetry Unplugged at Luna’s Cafe in Sacramento, 8pm (featured readers and open mic), chill out with the Love Jones Chill Night of love poetry at Laughs Unlimited in Old Sacramento, 8-10pm. Then on Saturday, the Second Saturday Reception from 2-8pm at the Sac. Poetry Center Gallery will feature Women’s Wisdom Art, including the Cowgirl Sweethearts performing music from 4-8pm. Scroll down to the blue column (under the green column at the right) for info about these and other upcoming poetry events in our area—and note that more may be added at the last minute.

—Medusa

 

 —Anonymous

Celebrate poetry—and read relentlessly!

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.

Visit of the Poets

“The silence of the meadowlark”
—Anonymous Photo
 

VISIT OF THE POETS
—Joyce Odam, Sacramento, CA
 
Then come to us
and we will give you
mysterious breads
and honey,
and we will give you
fruit to peel
and dates from
an apothecary jar.

And we will give you
all the hours of the night
for poetry
and bitter wine,
and we will give you
so much love
that you be drunk with us
and we with you.

And in the silence of
the meadowlark
whose broken song
has echoed through and through
and through,
we will give you
burning eyes
and a sun-torn hour
to take away
with you.


(first pub. in Aye, 1974, and The Poet, Being mini-chap, 2002)

___________________

Thanks, Joyce, for this beautiful poem! And note that the MoST Poetry Association will be holding a reading today at 240 Broadway in Turlock, featuring Joseph Nolan and others. Scroll down to the blue column (under the green column at the right) for info about this and other upcoming poetry events in our area—and note that more may be added at the last minute.

—Medusa

Send Out the Call

Davis, CA—Rain
—Poems and Photos by James Lee Jobe, Davis, CA

Bring forth the silent, still surface of the lake at midnight,
And bring forth the smell of the pines, the smell of dirt.

Light the incense and the candles. Strike the gong and call
The humans to the gathering. Kneel together as one.

Bring the sound of a child's first footsteps
Against the wooden planks of the cabin floor.

Send out the call—across the valley, through the hills.
Send out the call—the hour has come at last.

You are welcome here, just as you have always hoped.

This is the hour of offerings, this is moment of genuflecting
To something that is greater than us, and cannot be seen.

Bring your hearts in their finest offerings of love,
Love that is pure and untouched by want or need.

There is no past, no future. There are no sins or regrets.
Leave all the darkness behind you and step into the light.

Bring the children and the elderly and the infirm.
The hour of offerings is for everyone, for every soul.

You are welcome here, just as you have always hoped.

 Davis, CA—Rain

The thought was immense.
It took all of us to think it through.
Thinking a thought like that required tools and an assistant.
All day we worked under the sweet valley sun,
Laboring with mindful attention.
When the evening came we put that thought to rest,
And all around us was the sound of crickets. 

 Davis, CA—Rain

A Cuban torch song from the 1950s plays in the background,
A little too loudly. Perhaps the song is actually in the foreground.
It is a beautiful spring day, but I cannot bring myself to go outside.

My son has been dead for one month, and his ashes wait
In a little box on the table beside the hallway to his old room.
During the day, when I walk past, I touch this box very lightly.

My, how long the days have become. How slow.

 Davis, CA—Rain

In the middle of the night I woke up. I often do.
I went into the living room for a while. I sat.
From a dark corner I heard a voice, rough, harsh.
Or did I imagine it? Had I dropped off for a moment
And dreamed this voice? That’s possible.
It seemed to want something from me.
Was it my dead son? I wondered that, alone in the night.
It could be him, I thought, angry at me
For being a worthless father,
For failing to teach him enough to even survive.
“Go, Son, rest now. Don’t stay here.”
I said it out loud. “It’s been over a year;
You should be resting now. Sleep.”
I left the living room and went back to bed,
But I didn’t sleep right away.
For a long time I stared at the lamp
That I just couldn't bring myself to turn off.

 Davis, CA—Rain

The universe is a river and often she bathes
And swims. Lovely in her nakedness, even
After so many years, she slips into the water
And lets the universe wash her clean again.

The universe is a river and often I bathe
And swim. In the rushing water I can lower
My guard, be weak, show my vulnerability.
I can let the universe wash me clean again.

Come to the river.
Lay down your clothes and swim.

_____________________

The stars tonight shine like love.
The moon glows in agreement.
Your lips and your kiss are enough
For me again tonight. Wife.

_____________________

Today’s LittleNip:
 
Restraint and patience. Wisdom and diligence.
Above all, kindness and generosity.
May I seek out ways to practice these every day,
And be thankful that I can.

—James Lee Jobe

_____________________

Our thanks to James Lee Jobe for his fine poems today, and his photos of Davis in the rain! This blessed rain…

Tonight is the annual fundraiser for Sacramento Poetry Center, an event which is now called The Miller Party in honor of Burnett and Mimi Miller who hosted it for many years at their lovely home. Tonight it will be held at the home of Bob Stanley and Joyce Hsiao, 4010 Random Lane in Sacramento, from 6-8pm. There will be food, fun and frolic, with music by the Elizabeth Unpingco Duo and poetry by Lawrence Dinkins (NSAA). $30/person at the door.

Scroll down to the blue column (under the green column at the right) for info about this and other upcoming poetry events in our area—and note that more may be added at the last minute.

—Medusa

 Welcoming Rain!

—Anonymous Photo
Celebrate poetry!

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.