Sky Song

Full Moon

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

AN OLD SUMMER

I am in my tiny sailboat on
the small pond—one among many
such sailors—up to our knees—

guiding our boats carefully,
that we not bump into each other,
all our parents

sitting on the bank, smiling to us,
so easily pushing our small white boats
around and around in criss-cross patterns.

I am so comfortable,
I simply close my eyes
and drift in my sleepiness,

the sunlight sparkling
on the shallow water around me,
sounds murmuring away,

my parents also are sleeping now,
lying quietly together on the bank,
beginning to dream—

the day reaches its peak
and, all at once, I am alone,
pushing myself around in the small boat,

drifting out and away
     amid the sun-flickerings
          on the smooth surface of the water.

 Low Tide, Sunset

THE LONG BEACH PIER, 1940’s

Ah :
for the very first cry.

Ah!
for the perils of time.

Chances spent
like coins at a carnival.

The plushy toys.
The bright balloons.

Clink of coins in glass dishes.
Amber and red reflections.

Grating music and shoving crowds—
I, singled out, for myself.

My life on the next turn—
rides I paid for—each thrill dared—high

on the Ferris Wheel over the dangerous ocean—
or on the most beautiful horse on the ancient carousel.

 Ebb and Flow

A WINTER BY THE SEA

No one was watching, so we went away.
The sea followed with its great sound and

motion ebbing and swelling, cold and haunting.
All the pale gulls of gray skies cried and hovered,

holding their cold places against the colder
ending.  We had to leave them there, beyond

our calling—faint with distance—our own—
all we remembered.  Our tears blew from

our faces, and we felt the drying.  Nothing
was worth the weeping, we decided,

though our eyes retained the burning.

____________________

THE MUSE, MUSING AROUND IN MY HEAD

She was younger than I expected, kinda sad,
if you know what I mean, as if I actually
knew her, though she was
here—
in my head—
like a dream
and she was comforting me,
comforting me.
But why?
I felt no need of her,
no joyful or painful recognition,
no words pressing me to hurry.
And I could not hurry.
I was at the beginning of a scream.
I felt it,
building,
and I was paralyzed,
paralyzed in the dream,
the muse
wavering
brokenly around me
like something forgotten,
and old now,
and withering, like fire-smoke, or fog,
shot through with headlights
in the middle of an ocean—one I could not
swallow with my throat so full of scream,
and my muse
was distantly humming, something familiar,
and I had words,
I had the words, and we were writing . . . .

 Midnight Moon

MEASURING-UP

You thought the stars would move her,
the sentiment of roses,
the well-rehearsed looks
from your adoring eyes—

even long walks by the summer ocean or
braving some tawdry neighborhood with all its
danger : the following shadows : the undertones
of warning : your bravado : her challenge to you :

and you obliged—her own star in the heavens,
endless roses, suffering looks
from your adoring eyes—the way
you never understood her.

 The Sea At Rest

THE SORROW WAVE 

(After “Wave” by Margaret Atwood)

How strong the sorrow wave—
that long journey across time—
that vast water—that sea—

that constant rhythm,
loud and lonely—
on a 'like' beach—on a

pulse of revelation—oh,
cowering bright soul—oh,
single figure wandering there,

inside a terror,
toward a distant sign that says,
Mortal,   Stop Here,   and Rest.

 Sleep Easy, Earth

now the world
    Ice Splitting, Baikal Lake

is split
it is tearing in half at the long seam of the ocean

and beneath the waterfall of the mountain.
I hear it crack in the silence of

inattention.
something like a soft cry

or a low
moan

somewhere between
hell and heaven

a width children could
still jump across

I see the shadow
widening

and how deep
it goes

deeper by the years
and decades

sunsets echo it—
strange clue—

formations cross the sky
sky song asking why

_____________________

Today’s LittleNip:

SEA HAG  
—Joyce Odam

She dances her bony siren-dance on the    
shrouding shore as you in your shanty
stir the clam-bisque on your small
wood stove; she offers a gull-feather in

return for just one bowl; she offers to
dance all night for you—as memory—
as mist—then laughs her awful laugh.
Snuff the candle. Lock the gate. Evoke

some half-forgotten rune that will send
her away. Don’t risk your soul for hers.
She lives in the sea and cannot be
appeased. Resist. She can’t be saved.

_____________________

Today’s thanks to Joyce Odam—who can never resist a chance to write about the sea, so our Seed of the Week, Lost at Sea, found her with plenty of fine poems and artwork. Our new Seed of the Week is “Broken”. What is it that is broken? Promises? Your heart? Or just a window? 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.

____________________

—Medusa

Flying Fish

—Public Domain Photo Courtesy of Joseph Nolan

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