—Photo by Katy Brown, Davis
YELLOW
SANDS
at play on
the beach at Varna
yellow on
dark waters
Black Sea
that wore its way finally
through
the Bosporus to the Mediterranean
hot and
surly lake that became a sea
and in it
dazzling life
hot and
yellow
deadlier
than vampires
saltier
than sailfish
with claw
and tentacle reach
stretches
to deadly, my sweet, the skillful
skate
cunning
catshark
ingenious
jellyfish
piked
dogfish
hammerhead
shark
weever
through weeds
scorpaena
scoops
oops!
stingray hiding in the rocks
hot and
yellow
deadlier
than vampires snarling at midnight
as you
grope through the tangled darkness
Black Sea
bitterness rolls out
clutches
hot yellow sands where you think you run free
remembered
glory of inland lake all to itself
without
bother in its aloneness
hey,
get off the beach!
—Patricia Hickerson, Davis
_________________
BLIND THE DAWN
BLIND THE DAWN
—B.Z. Niditch, Brookline, MA
Landscaped intimacy
of mingled bird voices
admit your eyes
at first light,
you walk in
jumbled passages
beneath garden brambles,
waking the fields
of a distant countryside
that tastes the sun
consumed under the sky
full of swallows,
with a blanket awareness
on still hidden mirages
along submerged paths
of cloud thin trees
by the arboretum,
reflecting rays
on the camera
as still-life branches
cast reflections
along earth-wise stones
hidden on common grounds
tamed from silence
on uninvited lenses
in pools of green wood.
—Photo by Katy Brown
NOBODY LANDS
—B.Z. Niditch
Sea voices
shadow domes of elms
along flooded rivers
on nobody lands,
too early for dawn's
escape
perched under the sun
on the last isle,
as bird flight and song
cover a landscape's
fluting
opening a map's voyage
to unknown memory,
here with intense fruit
wrapped in berry boxes
on long picnic tables
gathers for its guests
as fibrillating rays wash
on the windward Cape
between sky and dawn
crossing our leafy eyes
on tall wild grass
by dunes
and ditch water sands
of a greensward shore,
far away from everything
except for the glitter
of a deaf time
in all its Fall disguises
taking leaves by shade
in a morning blush
of reddened visibility
from mirrors of nature's
unexpected recognition.
__________________
UNSETTLED DAWN
—B.Z. Niditich
That was only shade
in gestures by the
staircase
eclipsed from night swells
here by changing shapes
of ocean haze
returning from the Cape
of phantom memory
as ideas float on waves
with spacious sounds
of birdsong from the
dunes,
breaths of wind
fill echoes of sea voices
away from unshackled time
of fragrant shadows
along the greensward shore
when first light marvels
from the quick landscape
of budding words
offering us sleepless news
of nature's nascent signs
along the coast,
our footpaths consumes
the sunshine moving us
like whispers
in corners and crevasses
on the muffled sand
oblivious to your fingers
holding a pear
you wander in the yard
outside of Bay windows
from a scent of Fall's
colors
barely tossed about us.
__________________
UNDER THE BOARDWALK
—Michael Cluff, Corona
Christopher found
unused Monopoly money
mixed in with real dollar
bills
from the nineteen forties
crisp like lettuce
just liberated from the
loam
near Lodi or Madera.
Since the game
was originally
Grandpa Dale's,
Chris was not non-plussed
the family rumors
must be right,
Grandad would hide
currency
from Grandmama Marian
since her compulsion
to buy haircombs
and kitsch salt and pepper
shakers
ran too rampant
under those days
of harvest moons
and calf eyes
from any stranger
on the smaller town
streets.
_________________
Thanks to today's contributors; we continue to think about birds and the sea and other escape-from-the-heat kinds of activities. Escaping as well is Katy Brown, who is on the road to Michigan with a cat in a rental truck, helping her daughter move. Keep track of her journey on her Facebook page.
Rattlesnake Press is proud to announce tonight's release of another issue of our quarterly poetry journal, WTF, edited by frank andrick with help from Rachel Leibrock. Join the gang at Poetry Unplugged at Luna's Cafe, 1414 16th St., Sac. tonight at 8pm to hear contributors read and other merriment—free, and copies of WTF are also free! There are also free copies at The Book Collector, Home of the Snake, 1008 24th St., Sac. If you are a contributor but didn't get a copy, let me know at kathykieth@hotmail.com and I'll send you one. That goes for past issues, as well.
________________
Today's LittleNip:
LITTLETHORP
—Patricia Hickerson
poems are
wild dogs
run loose
no rules
untidy
ferocious
bite
your soul
______________
—Medusa
—Photo by Katy Brown
