GUIDE DOG
—Jane Blue, Sacramento
My life unfolds in the brilliant greens of spring.
Against clouds, flowers seem brighter—rhododendrons,
azaleas, roses, snapdragons, pansies, whizzing by.
A blind man, his dog preceding, boards the bus.
The dog sniffs the driver’s seat, which the driver has left
to show the man to an empty seat. Perhaps the dog
thinks she should drive. A woman begins talking loudly
about how a man in a wheelchair had run over her foot.
As though all disabilities are the same, and annoying.
As though the blind man is deaf. As though the dog
is a chair. The blind man stares straight ahead
and the dog lays her head on her paws on the bus floor.
In soft rain all the colors of spring streak by.
_________________
Thanks, Jane! Jane was the first to send a poem to celebrate the Year of the Dog, and she has requested Jim Jobe’s new rattlechap (“I really admire his poetry,” she says). Send Medusa a poem of your own this week—about dogs or new beginnings or whatever tweaks your pen—and I'll send you a rattlechap, either James DenBoer's Black Dog, or Jeanine Stevens' new The Keeping Room, or any Rattlechap you don't already have (let me know). Your poem has to get to me by FRIDAY, though, so email is probably best: kathykieth@hotmail.com.
From now on, each Monday’s post will try to keep up with local poetry events for the week. This may mean that some are added AFTER Monday, so keep checking. I’ll also try to note them each day as they come in, though. For example, here are some that I didn’t post on Monday (but have gone back and added):
•••Josh McKinney announces the following: CSUS (Creative Writing) in conjunction with the Visiting Scholars Program presents "The Nymph Stick Insect: Science, Faith, and Poetry", a presentation and reading by Forrest Gander, on Wednesday, Feb. 1, 7-8 pm, Amador Hall 150, CSUS Campus. Free/open to public.
•••On Friday (2/3), The Other Voice presents Mehdi Moghaddam for an evening of music, dance and poetry inspired by the Persian poet, Rumi. They meet at 7:30 pm in the library of the Unitarian Church at 27074 Patwin Road, Davis, CA.
•••This Sunday (2/5) at 6 pm, experience the interplay of voice with voice, voice with music as Susan Hennies and Joe Finkleman present Two-Voice Poetry with Music, with Francesca Reitano on flute. Location: Room 11 at the Unitarian Universalist Society of Sacramento, 2425 Sierra Blvd., 2 blocks north of Fair Oaks Blvd, between Howe and Fulton Avenues.
And finally, a memorial for Davis Poet Charlie MacDonald will be held on Sat., Feb. 11 at 2 p.m. at Wiscombe's Davis Funeral Chapel, 116 D Street, Davis.
VALHALLA
—Ann Wehrman, Sacramento
Barney,
our barrel-bodied,
middle-aged,
weimaraner-shepherd mix,
lay on the kitchen tiles,
left hind leg
kicking, twitching
in her sleep;
in her dreams,
she ran through ancestral forests
of black Bavarian Pine
chasing uber-rabbits,
the giant stag and boar,
racing fleet as an Indian
through tall trunks
over moss, twigs, and loam,
sure of foot, blind in the wind,
tongue lolling,
raising her voice
in a midnight howl
as over the wood, the moon rose full.
_______________________
TRAVELS WITH COWBOY
—Taylor Graham, Somerset
A long drive down the Valley, cold
then warm and cool again, the kind of day
in March when the season can go either
way, back to winter or ahead to spring;
a day that draws new grass from unplowed
fields and hazes the horizon silver.
We arrive at last at our motel.
I walk our young dog, Cowboy, out back,
and he turns to me with Taco’s gaze—
Taco who died before this pup was born.
Taco, who spent many a night with us
in this same motel.
This evening, the tepid air, no longer
winter and not quite spring, takes me back
to walking other dogs between this hedge
and freeway fence. Dogs long dead
look me in the eye, through the eyes
of this new Cowboy.
And here’s a lonely gap in the fence
where drifters after dark will slip
from westbound interstate to shrubbery.
Like us, they’ll be out of here by dawn.
We travelers through our seasons
of losing, leaving, moving on.
________________________
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com 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.)