Bringing That Sloth Up To Speed

 

Dysphoric View
—Poetry by Kimberly Bolton, Caschwa, Joseph Nolan
—Public Domain Photos Courtesy of Joseph Nolan

 

 

 

 I FOLLOWED MY FEET
—Kimberly Bolton, Jefferson City, MO

And ended up here, as always,
Where the river’s voice is a low murmur,
Telling me of what was, what is, what might be.
A patch of white fog lowers like a lonesome old ghost
Come to commiserate with both of us,
The river and myself.

I am now half-way through my life,
My age a mere teardrop in the millennia this river
Has existed.
And here I sit, out on the sandbar,
Taking measure of what little good I have done,
Counting all my sins like small change,
Taking stock of best intentions gone awry,
Feeling the balanced weight of consequence and regret
Inside me.

The river has heard all this from me before,
And, tired of listening, continues to move on past
What is now termed as the new middle-aged female,
You know, forty is the new thirty, fifty is the new forty,
Sixty the new fifty, and so forth and so on
According to television hype, magazine articles,
And all the self-help books crowding bookstore shelves,
As if they could put a stop to the inevitable.
As if.

 

 

 

 

 

IN THE MIRROR
—Kimberly Bolton

I gaze at the woman in the mirror,
I stare in utter amazement, in fact,
And in complete shock at this impossible absurdity.
This young girl, whose body I once stared at
Within this same mirror no less,
Stared at her in high-toned reverence and delight,
That young girl has made a hasty retreat.
She never even gave me the chance to say goodbye.

 

 

 

 

 

AND THEY PREACH PREVENTION
—Caschwa, Sacramento, CA

it was about 20 years ago,
just another day, he strutted
over to the door, stepped
out on the stoop, and then
the pain overtook him from
his leg up through the lower
back, making it impossible for
him to descend the stairs to
get to his car and go to work

a simple phone call cleared
the calendar for a day or 2,
whatever would be necessary
and then all the doubts started
creeping up: was this the result
of the motorcycle crash about 4
decades prior, where the leg was
almost lost?

even knowing his history, the
current medical provider won’t
test him proactively for problems
that might occur, but wait until the
patient presents with a dire
problem to spring into action

so, better not to involve the HMO
doctor and his medical team on
this because they only work on
cases where they can bill for their
time, the earlier care was on his
parents’ insurance plan, no longer
active, and he didn’t need extra
hoops to jump through while tending
to a bad leg

and what about later? if he were
to display some classic indicators
for early Alzheimer’s disease, would
these be just more secrets in the
pines forcing him to wait until he was
certifiably crazy to get any real help…. 

 

 

 

 

SHINING BRIGHTLY SOMEWHERE
—Caschwa

there was a time when
I tried to buy a copy
of my medical
records from seven years back
when I lay in a
comatose state for ten days,
or so I’ve been told,
and the girl at the window
assured me that those
records had all been shredded,
which caught me off-guard
because this was the very
facility where
I had been born, of all things
and they still kept a
record of that old event;
now if I had big
money, connections, and sway
I might have gotten
better results from that place
to fill in the gaps
my memory had erased,
as I look around
and see masses of people
who likewise don’t have
money, connections, and sway
not allowed to voice
their concerns on the issues
not allowed to have
a memory worth keeping
their star missing from
the Hollywood Walk of Fame
but shining brightly somewhere 

 

 

 

 

DIXIE DANCE
—Caschwa

it must have been from hearing low brass
musicians pulling air from diaphragms deep,
choosing from various shapes of mutes
feeling sympathetic vibrations from upper partials
blaring tones on the order of pedal
and reaching different notes with a slide

motion more stimulating than vacation slides
exploring ranges little known to the top brass
though maybe less inviting than a gas pedal
with wonders all around like deep-
sea diving, treasure hunting, where even partial
chests of bounty leave one muted

so you reach for the remote’s mute
button, and whisper secrets that will slide
into your over-confident partner’s partial
memory, due to hits on the head with brass
knuckles when younger, causing deep
wrinkles on the skull, weak mind left to pedal

his bike by the trombone’s pedal
tones, gently altered by a cup mute
creating the perfect background sound for a deep
sleep, not safe while cycling, because a landslide
might engulf the bike and rider, brass
band notwithstanding, quite partial

to entertaining the dead at funerals only, partially
ready to slam the brake pedal
to the floor, let the local police collect their own brass
shell casings, as you disdainfully commute
to your daily, dutiful slide
down into the deep

trenches that define your life, deep,
dark, chicken bone stuck in your lower partial
that you are ever more eager to slide
easily away, no more problem, soft pedal
all the notes, as if scored by a deaf-mute
who toted a bag to recycle your brass

deep, sexy clarinet plays over pedal tones
in a partial comedy that serves to mute
all attempts of the slide trombone’s daring brass 

 

 

 

Bring Back Memories?

 

TO POSTERITY …..
—Caschwa

our daring derriere hangs out there…

the world had edges and corners
            now it’s a globe
asbestos was a praiseworthy attribute
            now it’s terrible and wrong
slavery was legal and common
            now it’s just common
our solar system had 9 planets
            now we let one get away
proud family would die before betraying confidences
            now their secrets are in the pines

 

 

 

 

YOU CANNOT CHANGE
THE NATURE OF A BEAST
—Joseph Nolan, Stockton, CA

You cannot change
The nature of a beast.

You can’t bring a sloth
Up to speed.

You cannot make a leopard
Change its spots.

You cannot make a beggar
Into someone who “gots.”

You cannot turn
A snake into a hose,

Or turn a dozen church-ladies
Into a club of ho’s.

You cannot get a miner
To give out a beat,
Tapping with a hammer,
Coal-dust around his feet.

More likely he just
Wants to go home,
Open up his six-pack,
‘Cause he’s all alone,
At the end of his day,
Inside the dark,
Down inside a tunnel,
As black as black as coal!

Nor can a priest
Make whole
Any lost soul
Who is not ready
To open to the light,
That sweeps away
Whatever it is
That keeps him
In his hole. 

 

 

 

 

MY INNER MIDGET
—Joseph Nolan

I play old tapes,
The ones I know,
Though I know
They’re hopeless, so!

Yet I live upon their rhythms,
Life as simple, floating whims,
The way I’ve always been.

I cannot even help him—
My midget, deep inside.
My midget vows
He’ll never tell
What binds him to his pages,
The lines he’s read for ages
And can never let go!

 

 

 

 

 LOVE IN THE TIME OF MASKING
—Joseph Nolan

This is no time for movies,
No time for cinema,
No time for munching popcorn,
No time for making love.

All the secrets
We sent to the screen
Return as Amazon packages,
Loitering on our doorsteps,
That no-one will take in.

No-one admits
To what she desired
Or to what
Has transpired
Under awnings,
So discrete!

Furtive longings
That cannot meet
Somewhere shady,
Down the street
Where lovers
Start to love.

Now we all make
Masks our skin,
Keeping out
Those we’d let in
To be far more familiar,
Far more than six feet apart!

 

 

 

 

THE NEXT WORLD
—Joseph Nolan

Humble thee under
A thousand rays of beauty,
From a gentle sun
Where life goes on
In the grace of acceptance,
Under a loving patina—
All honors already won.

Tokens, gifted in friendship,
Kindness, the offering
Of love,
Where efforts
Bring forth full plenty,
Where beauty
Comes from above. 

 

 

 

Today’s LittleNip(s):

OVERTURNING ROCKS
—Joseph Nolan

When you overturn a rock,
Some spiders may crawl out,
Scorpions and serpents,
Enough to make you shout
Out loud,
“I never knew
We had so many!
I fear to overturn
Another single rock!”

* * *

OLD EUROPEAN CAR BLUES
—Joseph Nolan

Dirty, rotten dying parts,
In my rotting heap,
Waste all of my money
And keep me from my sleep.

* * *

CORRECTIONAL CENTER
(a Haiku in skeletal form only)
—Caschwa

syllables ready
two convicts met to dual
they brought pairing knives

_____________________

Our thanks to today’s contributors, Kimberly Bolton, Joseph Nolan and Carl Schwartz (Caschwa), for their work in the Kitchen on this first Monday of December! Carl continues to fiddle with forms: “Dixie Dance” is his clever Sestina, and “Shining Brightly Somewhere” is a Choka. Join us on Form Fiddlers' Friday for more about that.

Tonight at 7:30pm, Sac. Poetry Society presents Socially Distant Verse with Phoenix Devine and Koe Creation. Join Zoom at 7:15pm (us04web.zoom.us/j/7638733462. Password: spcsdv2020). Reading starts at 7:30pm. Info: www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=10157667924430980&set=gm.737241860210993/.

Sac. Poetry Center assures us that, while they re-organize, their weekly workshops continue apace. There’s a Medusa listing of this in the blue column at the right of this one. And it broke my heart to do it, but I removed the list of local workshops in the green column (above the blue column), figuring that, if they’re meeting on Zoom and want more poets, they’ll let me know and I’ll re-post them. Otherwise, most groups won’t be meeting until after this COVID-CHAOS is over.

Big doin’s Zoomin’ our way on Thursday this week:

•••Thurs. (12/10), 5:30pm: An invitation to discuss concerns and questions about Sac. Poetry Center with the Board at Zoom: us02web.zoom.us/j/7638733462  Meeting ID: 763 873 3462;  Passcode: spcsdv2020
 

ALSO: SPC Board urges you to complete an online survey about their operations before Dec. 15 midnight: forms.gle/A7mqbSVYLBzKpust5

•••Thurs. (12/10), 7:30-9pm: UCD PhD candidate Thomas Hardy speaks about Language Acquisition & Language Learning on Zoom: Meeting Rm. ID: 828 3933 9639. Host: Frank Graham. Info: www.facebook.com/events/114362950397995

Also this week:

•••Fri., 7:30pm: Video poetry reading on Facebook by Davis Poet Laureate James Lee Jobe at james-lee-jobe.blogspot.com/ or youtube.com/jamesleejobe/.

•••For more about El Dorado County poetry events, check Western Slope El Dorado poetry on Facebook: www.facebook.com/ElDoradoCountyPoetry/.

________________________

—Medusa

 

 

 

Photos in this column can be enlarged by
clicking on them once, then clicking on the x
in the top right corner to come back to Medusa.

Would you like to be a SnakePal?
All you have to do is send poetry and/or
photos and artwork to
kathykieth@hotmail.com. We post
work from all over the world, including
that which was previously-published.
Just remember:
the snakes of Medusa are always hungry—
for poetry, of course!