Photo by Jim Halverson
HONOR
—Barbara March, Cedarville
Write a love note on
wasp nest paper
grey/white layer on layer
saliva, thrown to ground
for you who dream
words on nights
when fresh mown orchard grass
swirls sweet on air
blown through leaves of
lombardy poplar
Compose to the newborn horny
toad in your hand, round,
no larger than a quarter or small stone
to spotted triplet fawns grazing
with their mother in the east field
but before all these, first
honor the innocent horses of autumn
unwanted, unfed, discarded to wander
before snow fall
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Thanks to Barbara March for responding to our Fall Giveaway/Seed of the Week: Autumn poems, and thanks for sending a photo to go with it. It's not too late: send me poems about Fall that you wrote yourself and I'll send you Pat Grizzell's new rattlechap, Thirteen Poems. That's kathykieth@hotmail.com or P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726. This SOW has a deadline, though: midnight Friday, Sept. 26—hey, that's tonight!
This weekend in NorCal poetry:
•••Sat. (9/27), 1:15 PM and Sun. (9/28), 12:15 PM: Brigit Truex, Rebecca Morrison, Charlene Ungstad, and Jeanine Stevens read at the KVMR Celtic Festival & Marketplace in Grass Valley at the Nevada County Fairgrounds, 11228 McCourtney Rd., Grass Valley. $15-$55. Their exact venue can be found on the program; see kvmr.org/. 530-265-9073. Entertainment also includes music, historic re-enactments, athletic demonstrations, animal exhibits and more.
•••Saturday (9/27), Noon-4 PM: 15th Annual Dancing Poetry Festival at San Francisco's Florence Gould Theater in the California Palace of the Legion of Honor Art Museum. Info: www.dancingpoetry.com/.
•••Sat. (9/27), 7-9 PM: ‘The Show’ poetry series presents Myisha Cherry from Brooklyn, plus Sacramento's own Jock Smith, Jamarr Jones aka Young Mack, Yolanda Stevenson and Chadwick Jamison. Wo'se Community Center 2863 35th St. off 35th and Broadway, Sacramento. $5 general admission. All artists (poets, singers, musicians, comedians, etc.) are encouraged to sign up early for open mic. Info: 916-208-POET.
•••Sunday (9/28), 4:30 PM: Poems-For-All is pleased to welcome Donald Sidney-Fryer presenting The Atlantis Fragments, his omnibus edition of the trilogy, Songs and Sonnets Atlantean. The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sacramento. Info: 916-442-9295.
•••Sunday (9/28), 2 PM: Jane Crown has a radio talk show that features poetry, and she has interviewed several of our local poets and other SnakePals, including B.L. Kennedy, W.S. Gainer, frank andrick and many others. She will be interviewing RD Armstrong this Sunday at 2 PM, PDT. Check it out at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/The-Jane-Crown-Show. And check out her past interviews on her archives at http://www.janecrown.com/.
•••Monday (9/29), 7:30 PM: Sacramento Poetry Center presents Alan Williamson and Andrena Zawinski at HQ for the Arts, 25th & R Sts., Sacramento. Open mic after.
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More Fall poems, these from Peggy Hill. Thanks, Peggy!
FALL MARDI GRAS
—Margaret Ellis Hill, Wilton
Autumn claims her place late in the year,
presents a paler sun, cloud quilts. Winds
clean scraps of summer, but from my window
I watch a Mardi Gras.
Usually, the stand of birch on the corner
looks like stately ladies graced with
green sequins covering white limbs.
Overnight, it seems, King Midas touched them.
Aided by breezes, the trees strip themselves
bare, little by little as they toss
handfuls of golden doubloons
to imaginary crowds waiting on the lawn.
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SUMMER’S END
—Margaret Ellis Hill
The darkness crumbles away,
but allows the light to stumble
through building thunderheads.
Small pillows of clouds precede them
to mark the return of Autumn days.
Too soon the summer ends, my friend;
its greens will tumble into gold.
Relish fall’s fancy-leafed dresses before
the north winds blow the gowns away.
The stripteased trees are ready to be washed,
and dried with large and long white towels.
I know that they will fall asleep until
the sun’s spring slant awakens them
to blossoms and berries and new attire.
Ah winter, you must love
nakedness under snowy blankets.
I wonder what motive. Your gallantry—
simply protection or private perusal.
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THIS FALL MOON, OCTOBER 2004
—Margaret Ellis Hill
Watch her blink
to reveal the sienna eye shadow—
an actress giving me
a slow-motion lesson in seduction.
She slices the sky on a set path,
returns to a stark stare that merely
brightens the night. I wrap
my sweater tighter and head home.
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Today's LittleNip:
It's not the most intellectual job in the world, but I do have to know the letters.
—Vanna White
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—Medusa
SnakeWatch: What's New from Rattlesnake Press:
Now available at The Book Collector in Sacramento and also from rattlesnakepress.com/: Thirteen Poems, a new chapbook from Patrick Grizzell; #2 in Katy Brown's series of blank journals (Musings2: Vices, Virtues and Obsessions); a free littlesnake broadside (Wind Physics) from Jordan Reynolds; plus Issue #19 of Rattlesnake Review (also free!). Contributor and subscription copies of RR19 will be going into the mail this week. If you're neither one and can't get to The Book Collector for your free copy, send me two bux and I'll mail you one. Next deadline for submissions, by the way, is November 15.
Coming in October: October’s release at The Book Collector on Weds., Oct. 8, will feature a new rattlechap from Moira Magneson (He Drank Because) and a littlesnake broadside from Hatch Graham (Circling of the Pack). That's at the Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sacramento, 7:30 PM. Refreshments and a read-around will follow; bring your own poems or somebody else’s.
Then, on Thursday, Oct. 30, 8 PM, Rattlesnake Press will release two SpiralChaps to honor and celebrate Luna’s Café, including a new collection of art and poetry from B.L. Kennedy (Luna’s House of Words) and an anthology of Luna’s poets, artists and photographs (La Luna: Poetry Unplugged at Luna’s Café) edited by Frank Andrick. Come travel with our Away Team as we leave the Home of the Snake for a brief road trip/time travel to Luna’s Café, 1414 16th St., Sacramento to celebrate Art Luna and the 13 years of Luna's long-running poetry series. Who knows what auspicious adventures await us there??
Medusa's Weekly Menu:
(Contributors are welcome to cook up something for any and all of these!)
Monday: Weekly NorCal poetry calendar
Tuesday: Seed of the Week: Tuesday is Medusa's day to post poetry triggers such as quotes, forms, photos, memories, jokes—whatever might tickle somebody's muse. Pick up the gauntlet and send in your poetic results; and don't be shy about sending in your own triggers, too! All poems will be posted and a few of them will go into Medusa's Corner of each Rattlesnake Review. Send your work to kathykieth@hotmail.com or P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726. No deadline for SOW; respond today, tomorrow, or whenever the muse arrives. (Print 'em out, maybe, save 'em for a dry spell?) When you send us work, though, just let us know which "seed" it was that inspired you.
Wednesday (sometimes): HandyStuff Quickies: Resources for the poet, including whatever helps ease the pain of writing and/or publishing: favorite journals to read and/or submit to; books, etc., about writing; organizational tools—you know—HandyStuff! Tell us about your favorite tools.
Thursday: B.L.'s Drive-Bys: Micro-reviews by our irreverent Reviewer-in-Residence, B.L. Kennedy. Send books, CDs, DVDs, etc. to him for possible review (either as a Drive-By or in future issues of Rattlesnake Review) at P.O. Box 160664, Sacramento, CA 95816.
Friday: NorCal weekend poetry calendar
Daily (except Sunday): LittleNips: SnakeFood for the Poetic Soul: Daily munchables for poetic thought, including short paragraphs, quotes, wonky words, silliness, little-known poetry/poet facts, and other inspiration—yet another way to feed our ravenous poetic souls.
And poetry! Every day, poetry from writers near and far and in-between! The Snakes of Medusa are always hungry.......!
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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). And be sure to sign up for Snakebytes, our monthly e-newsletter that will keep you up-to-date on all our ophidian chicanery.