Put Away All Mirrors

—Poetry by Sam Barbee, Winston-Salem, NC

—Photos Courtesy of Public Domain

THE GRAY STONE
 
The man who had always
            enjoyed listening
woke up with a third ear.
 
He was upset, because he had
            always prayed for
a third eye to see more things.
 
His third ear made him a better
            listener but he remained
certain a third eye, placed in
 
the middle of his forehead,
            would help him
see things never seen.  So,
           
again he prayed,
            but this time also
rubbed a smooth grey stone.
 
And with dawn, he had
            his coveted third eye,
but all three ears were gone.

 

 

 

 

SMALL ACTIONS
 
At the kitchen sink, you fill a silver saucepan
from the tap.  Announce
                                         this is the last time
to fill the hummingbird feeder with sugar water.
The open window fresh with September;
screen wavering with vacated webs.
If they linger here, they will die over winter.
 
I remark on Bloodroot and Black-Eyed Susies
below the sill.
                         Susans . . . Susans . . . you bristle,
and glisten with proper semantics—curved and coped
by morning breeze.  You mention thirst for meadows
and mountains.  Melody of a verdant branch.
 
Or a flight to the Yucatan—with the hummingbirds—
where all fragile creatures drink sunlight.  Bathe
in rain forest’s absolute wet: in a woman’s rain
across a woman’s gulf where modest pleasures
bestow contentment.  Away from harsh morning’s
wring, red-warnings’ sting. 
                                             Only whole notes
in your soundtrack without despair.  You would
sail happy on a woman’s stream—calm currents,
buoy where it is never too late; from where nothing
can be an absolute act.  Nowhere
as your new home.

 

 

 

 

CONSEQUENCE
 
Mirrored in the window, courage mustered,
you reveal a new dress, pretty and yellow. 
 
Distorted across the room—pristine and brunette—
I value your attempts to refashion beauty.  
 
            Medusa’s gaze transmuted brave warriors to stone.
            An extra glance upon Sodom turned Lot’s wife to salt.
 
            Clots in a god’s narrative: fleshless pillars, arteries
            hardened, curling cavities where a heart once pulsed.
 
In my cowardice, I dare only corner your reflection
to assure my pulp does not congeal or fracture.
 
With songs and fables, you soften with intimacy’s tongue.
Simple thrill to bevel our bodies and enthrall my edge.    

 

 

 

 

             
MORNING TO REMEMBER
 
Hills and ridges level from a rumbling, stumbling giant, swiping and trampling
            pastoral things with his sandal.  No need for sunlight.  No shadows
form because the giant smashes big trees too, buildings, all upright things, back
            to another stone age.  People gather on corners and whisper together,
hand in hand the first time in a long time, breakfast dishes left undone, nothing
            sliced or stored.  The giant does not twist anything out, just stomps a singular path. 
 
He spares bendable boughs and promises to create a pleasant vista for everyone to admire.
            His only edict: put away all mirrors.  The people leave their groups on corners
            to drape wall mirrors in blankets and slide small ones into bottom drawers.
 
Without any silvered reflections, everyone naps the rest of the day.  Appliances
            idle.  No glasses of ice left on trays.  No condensation rings appear.
Un-fabled lands assume dignity.  Elated crows croon harmonies as everyone snoozes.
            Spiders dismantle untested webs.  Oaks and maples flex as equals.
Deliberations and negotiations on hold while everyone dreams peacefully.
            Shy flowers and cornels bloom, some for a second time this same season.
 
The giant’s laughter rouses everyone.  With fanfare, he leaves forests restored
            to lesser glory.  Familiar sadness re-envelops their lives—citizens theorize
            how lucky they were, startled awake in time for tea.

 

 

 

 

PHOBIA
 
Fear of crowds.  Fear of abandonment.
Fear of clouds and grandiose open spaces.
Laced with Latin, ending in grim suffixes:
-ism, -oia, -ice, -ectic, etc-etc . . . analysis
 
to arm a psyche against angsts.  Pride or shame. 
Getting away or homesick.  Stifled, reliving
wicked thoughts each night before sleep,
before sex, before concessions, and long after
 
gambits with sight and touch.  Judge and jury
straddle with a lap-dance seducing one more
private showing you cannot disremember.
Old friends, new friends.  Houseguests, house cats.
 
Long-gone elders’ admonitions and consolations . . .
sermons of forgiveness and forgetting.  Dismay
with a yawn.  Angels and goblins of midnight,
spooking, then gone, leaving you immobile,
 
with pitched-fever.  You stroll and meander,
frown and philander . . . functional terror.  Each
kiss or caress, prayer or prognosis . . . a mirror. 
Confusion versus confusion.

 

 

 

 

Today’s LittleNip:

THINGS BREAK
—Sam Barbee
 
I broke a favorite vase.
Sweeping it into a pile,
the vase reformed, crystal
still shimmering,
dulled cuts and etchings
embracing wicked edges.
 
Brushed into a tighter pile,
it reassembles as another vessel,
of refraction, of fidelity,
but still a vase at heart . . .  
permitting a pulse of joy
shape begetting shape.

______________________

Our thanks and welcome to Sam Barbee this morning from out here on the West Coast! Sam’s poems have appeared in Poetry South, The NC Literary Review, Crucible, Asheville Poetry Review, The Southern Poetry Anthology VII: North Carolina, Georgia Journal, Kakalak, and Pembroke Magazine, among others; plus on-line journals Vox Poetica, Sky Island Journal, Courtland Review and The New Verse News. 
 
His second poetry collection, That Rain We Needed (2016, Press 53), was a nominee for the Roanoke-Chowan Award as one of North Carolina’s best poetry collections of 2016.  He was awarded an "Emerging Artist's Grant" from the Winston-Salem Arts Council to publish his first collection, Changes of Venue (Mount Olive Press); has been a featured poet on the North Carolina Public Radio Station, WFDD; received the 59th Poet Laureate Award from the North Carolina Poetry Society for his poem, "The Blood Watch"; and is a Pushcart nominee. 

Thanks again, Sam; welcome to the Kitchen, and don’t be a stranger!

______________________

—Medusa (indeed proud to be in one of your poems!)

 

 

 

Sam Barbee

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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