Interpretation
—Poetry and Original Artwork by Joyce Odam, Sacramento, CA
ALIENATIONS
Come, birds,
come, words,
the world needs us—
we are special—
today—tonight—
wherever time finds us—
holding our lives at length,
even finding what we look for—
needing, avoiding, all that needs us :
Fly. Fail. Ease into sorrow—
like love into love that can never find us.
Come, birds,
come, words,
the world needs us—
we are special—
today—tonight—
wherever time finds us—
holding our lives at length,
even finding what we look for—
needing, avoiding, all that needs us :
Fly. Fail. Ease into sorrow—
like love into love that can never find us.
Inside Herself
WE ARE
all particle—of the earth—of the air—
of every whispering voice and every
tear fallen from grief, or joy, and every
tear for the silk fabric of fog, mist over
water, sound of crying, the harsh notes
of rage, the emptied stare,
looking at everything—brooding,
crying—the very act of this—the
very rhyming in every windowed
reflection made of glass, the sensation
of touch, the rush of pleasure, the feel
of darkness to the grope, the sunrise,
the sunset, the blur of hope in the frazzled mind, the very hope of existence in the doubt,
the distance and the near—the everything,
and everywhere—in this moment, here.
all particle—of the earth—of the air—
of every whispering voice and every
tear fallen from grief, or joy, and every
tear for the silk fabric of fog, mist over
water, sound of crying, the harsh notes
of rage, the emptied stare,
looking at everything—brooding,
crying—the very act of this—the
very rhyming in every windowed
reflection made of glass, the sensation
of touch, the rush of pleasure, the feel
of darkness to the grope, the sunrise,
the sunset, the blur of hope in the frazzled mind, the very hope of existence in the doubt,
the distance and the near—the everything,
and everywhere—in this moment, here.
Reflection
IMAGES OF SELF
Ponderous with light,
the figure moves
under its own illusion;
it carries another weight—
an equal darkness.
_____
Heavy as stone, the
second illusion imagines
itself as a wing—lifts and
fails—lifts and fails—
tries again and flies.
_____
Regret moves in a circle,
knows where it has failed,
yearns to correct the fault.
It comes at last to the shat-
tered face of the mirror.
_____
Old news crumples itself up
into a newspaper and begins
to fade to a sickening yellow.
Tired of itself now, it longs
for simple recipes and poems.
____________________
KNOWING WHAT FROM WHAT
Little is known about the truths
we tell—want to believe—need.
I've marked all the passages
that speak for me—
my praise for you, my awe
at how this works, the spark,
the flash of time that proves—
we who have words, who bless
and curse and need them so—
so wantingly.
Ponderous with light,
the figure moves
under its own illusion;
it carries another weight—
an equal darkness.
_____
Heavy as stone, the
second illusion imagines
itself as a wing—lifts and
fails—lifts and fails—
tries again and flies.
_____
Regret moves in a circle,
knows where it has failed,
yearns to correct the fault.
It comes at last to the shat-
tered face of the mirror.
_____
Old news crumples itself up
into a newspaper and begins
to fade to a sickening yellow.
Tired of itself now, it longs
for simple recipes and poems.
____________________
KNOWING WHAT FROM WHAT
Little is known about the truths
we tell—want to believe—need.
I've marked all the passages
that speak for me—
my praise for you, my awe
at how this works, the spark,
the flash of time that proves—
we who have words, who bless
and curse and need them so—
so wantingly.
Looking at the Moon
LOONEY TO THE TUNE
So, we are looney to the tune, and tipsy to the trying—
over-sounding when we laugh and when we cry—and
the dancing dances louder than the scratchy tune. Oh,
sing with us, in our slangy voices, weary and tipsy,
but we won’t go home. Sing with us, oh lonely music,
lonelier than we are in the heady crush of revelers, tipsy
as a gypsy celebration in a swirly tipsy room. Oh, how
we laugh at that and sing it loud, and louder, while the
weepy music herds us to the writhing center. Cry with
us—we are lonely—only for the crying of the music
risen now into a crying of its own—the room lights blur-
ring, and the music—and what care we— if tomorrow
never comes . . . our last cliché.
Timewise
LOVE
Love is the circle of being—
temper me,
temper
me—
take the curses out of my mouth—
tread me through all the waters,
the circular sea—
the circu-
lar
me.
___________________
SOME DEFINING WORD
Let us not forget how we were children, drawn
like a thread through some defining word,
blending ourselves into life’s conversation
before we thought of life as tragedy.
Innocence is first—first gift of children,
layered over—word by word by word—
How should we continue this conversation
without it becoming a singular tragedy?
Can we really know ourselves as children?
As if the meaning changes in that word
we give ourselves and use for conversation
to play the amusing role of tragedy.
In truth, we barely remember ourselves as
children, forgetting some year as one forgets a
word, leaving gaps of meaning in conversation
where there is always room for one more tragedy.
And here we are, bemoaning ourselves as children,
groping, it seems, for yet another word
to fill the gap in one more conversation
to prove we are—or are not—worth our tragedy.
Nowhere to Go
THAT TOUCH
white wings
where hope
lies thinly,
itself, an apparition,
itself, on fire
with loss and longing—
white wings
that flutter near—
touch—
and vanish—
leaving such a loneliness
you fill with fear
_____________________
UNTITLED
The mind breathes,
outward after inwards.
Love abandons.
We are standing on the edge.
Edge. Sanity.
Death is holding us down
Alone, unaided.
Silence streams out,
a scratch on its own edge.
The moment is a long one,
slow as silence
in its last cry.
_____________________
Today’s LittleNip:
ROUND AND AROUND
—Joyce Odam
Here lies and lies —
The contradiction—
One lies, the other lies :
Do you see
The contradiction ?
> | <
One gets its way .
The other rests
On the usual friction . . .
______________________
Many thanks to the gracious Joyce Odam for her poems and artwork today! Love those tipsy gypsies! Joyce is still publishing her elegant little Brevities with co-editor Robin Gale Odam; go to joyceofwords@gmail.com for single copies or ask about subscriptions. (No email mss.)
Our new Seed of the Week is Six Perfect Snowflakes. 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
white wings
where hope
lies thinly,
itself, an apparition,
itself, on fire
with loss and longing—
white wings
that flutter near—
touch—
and vanish—
leaving such a loneliness
you fill with fear
_____________________
UNTITLED
The mind breathes,
outward after inwards.
Love abandons.
We are standing on the edge.
Edge. Sanity.
Death is holding us down
Alone, unaided.
Silence streams out,
a scratch on its own edge.
The moment is a long one,
slow as silence
in its last cry.
_____________________
Today’s LittleNip:
ROUND AND AROUND
—Joyce Odam
Here lies and lies —
The contradiction—
One lies, the other lies :
Do you see
The contradiction ?
> | <
One gets its way .
The other rests
On the usual friction . . .
______________________
Many thanks to the gracious Joyce Odam for her poems and artwork today! Love those tipsy gypsies! Joyce is still publishing her elegant little Brevities with co-editor Robin Gale Odam; go to joyceofwords@gmail.com for single copies or ask about subscriptions. (No email mss.)
Our new Seed of the Week is Six Perfect Snowflakes. 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
Gypsy in Red Silk
—Public Domain Image
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.
