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Tuesday, August 07, 2012

Nothing to Save Us, But Love

—Photo by Joyce Odam




TO MUSICK
(After “To Musick” by Robert Herrick)
—Joyce Odam, Sacramento

I take your word—spell it olde—
impose the distance ever between

the now and then—enter—and be
there—listen for the beginning

that leads to here—that fills
between—that resonates—

that endures—only a thought long
and a yearn away

from what still charms the soul.
and enchants the ears.

________________

SPELLS

—Joyce Odam

 

Take my reluctant hand

with its seven slow lines

that go outward from the palm.


Trace my sad histories
with your discerning fingers;
hum a soft song.

Pull my eyes to your face
and there erase the seven sorrows
that I hide from myself.

Mention the tomorrows;
mention the seven lies that fit.
I will love you. I will leave

my hand in your hand while you
hypnotize my oldest terror.
I will follow you through

your language made of praise
while you gaze me deeper.
Soon I will float through your eyes

and there disguise myself with
seven veils. You will get lost
in them.
 
______________

SUMMONED
—Joyce Odam 


True as the gold light in your eye
that fastened like a sun
to my dark mirage,

a circle of stars, a core of words,
like a power surrounding you.
I was only heat-shimmer—

spinning in the light.
We did not reach,
I was dreaming on a blue ice floe,

you on another.
There was nothing to save us,
but love. Even our souls wept.
 



—Photo by Joyce Odam 


 
CHANT FOR ROPE JUMPERS
—Joyce Odam

catch in a pony tail
tangle the curl
twist in the fingers
rope trip a girl

rope be a measure
rope be the lie
jump to a thousand
and we’ll never die

slap on the sidewalk
snag in the grass
here comes a cripple
don’t let him pass

we never stumble
we never cheat
death fears the rhythm
of our feet

jump into moonlight
night is a hole
rope is a circle
that hands unroll

ninety nine hundred
jump till we drop
here come the mothers
to make us stop.

                

(first pub. in Yankee, 1964 and
Chapbook: The Confetti Within, 1964)

_________________

MEMORIES

—Joyce Odam


one by one I arrange them
on my shelves

sharp and brilliant
like glass

light-catchers
dust-holders

vain and useless
poignant and repetitive

giving in at last to new ones

                  ~

how my collection grows

conjured real
by tricks of incantations

become semi-precious
like stones

held by a spreading shimmer
till they dull and blend

by loss  
by years

each indiscernible
from the other

__________________

BREAKING THE SPELL
—Joyce Odam

It is how you repeat sad phrases to me
in your soft voice that diminishes . . .
                  ~               
If only you could give me music
I might hear . . .
                  ~               
Had you died, I would grieve, but silence
is only silence, as death is death . . .
                  ~               
Your body moved in a quiet dance—
a slow wreathe to the music I could not hear . . .
                  ~
How clever, the music, to escort you
into somewhere unreachable . . .
                  ~               
You turned away into yourself.
Not a shadow, not a mirror followed this . . .
                  ~
I pulled from myself what I knew of you,
all your spells and confusions . . .            
                  ~               
When you returned, it was with nothing you
remembered.  I wept and named you love.

______________

Thanks to Joyce Odam for today’s gourmet cookery, and congratulations to her on her 88th birthday! We are celebrating the occasion with her first-ever photo album on Medusa’s Facebook page—be sure to check it out!

This week’s Seed of the Week is La Golondrina. It seems like I see her nests everywhere, with giant beaks peaking over them, peering down at me. What do you have to say about La Golondrina—and why hasn’t she returned to Capistrano??

Also: last week our Form to Fiddle With was to write entire stories out of six words. Carl Schwartz stacked the six words rather than putting them out on a single line, giving each one more visual weight and making the form more poem-like. Taylor Graham invented another variation, making each line a six-word story that could stand on its own and then stringing them together with a very loose thread. (See her example, “60-Word Bio”, on our August 1 post.) But Taylor’s form needs a name—any ideas?

And we have a new Form With Which to Fiddle—the idyl/idyll (apparently nobody can decide how to spell it). The examples on Wiki are beautiful but somewhat archaic—nobody says you have to use old-fashioned tongues to admire the bucolic world around you. Let loose your idyllic self however suits you...

___________________

Today's LittleNip:

LOYALTY
—Joyce Odam

You have brought me a love poem,
and I learned its words and sang it back to you.

Your prayers were chants of sorrow.
You made me learn them, and now I pray for you.

You make circles and circles, which I enter.
They are both vanished and deep. Where am I.

Your eyes pull downward, and I find drowning
and a dark sleep. We are so old here.

Our eyes have turned to a grave of sadness.
The other mourners have left, and we no longer weep.

______________

—Medusa


  —Photo by Joyce Odam