Fools Rush In~

 

The Fool’s Errand

—Poetry and Photos by Joyce Odam, 

Sacramento, CA

THE OLD WOMAN DIGS THROUGH HER LIFE

in all the essences of time, the old beginnings met here,
at endings, all things resolved—or not—most likely not.
One always hopes for more.

The old woman digs through her life with a certain
determination—to make it sufficient. Sometimes
her silence rings with premonition, or else
closes upon the layers like a dream.

Which is it? She snaps awake from a thought
that frightens. She sleeps in a chair—leaned back—
before the television which plays all night long
to put some voices in the house.

 

 

 

Night Has A Need

 

IN THE PERILOUS TIMES

O, my little bird of tragedy—how sweetly
you sing, and how tenderly you cling,
to the golden branch of the singing tree.
And you aim for my heart, as if you were
a nightingale—and I thrill the more, for I
come from the land of sparrows and crows,
and the murmuring doves, when I wake up
in the fairy tale—and I don't know—and I  
don't care when I somehow find you there.   
 
____________________

THE ALBINO NIGHTINGALE
(After “No Swan So Fine”
by Marianne Moore)

Made of pure light, sent from imagina-
tion’s land, straight out of childhood’s
fairy tales—a nightingale of course, in
a silver cage, with an open door to test
its loyalty—mind’s albino nightingale   
that preens,  and sings,  and struts for
the emperor whose ownership proves
    vulnerable with mind-sweet trill.  
          I hear it still—all the way
                 from then to here.

 

 

 

The Essences of Time

 

THE WINTER CLOWN

The townsfolk say the Winter Clown
just appeared, like a piper, one boring day—
calling all the old children
to come and follow him through town.

Flirtatious Summer followed—made him play
the Fool for her—made him weep
huge red tears, and ride a tricycle.
She clapped her hands and laughed the time away.

When he ran out of tears, he tried
to be a balladeer—singing his heart out to her.
But Summer was not pleased, and cried—

to get her precious Fool back—turning cold
when he thrust his distorted mirror before
her face.  She did not know that she was old.

____________________

THE QUICK ERRAND

The child stands on a corner. Her mother has gone inside the store. It is almost closing time. “Wait here,” said the mother. The minutes drag into tearfulness. The passing, hurrying people look through the child, but the child fears they are looking right at her. “I’ll be right back,” said the mother. The child tried to protest, but the mother was already in her hurry. Now the evening is changing color, longer shadows, a feeling of blue to the air. The child begins to cry. No one slows to ask—what is the matter?—where is the mother? The corner narrows, becomes sharp with frightening new direction. It begins to rain. There are fewer people. The car lights turn blurry. The child looks in-side the door to find the mother : what if she went out the wrong way? worries the child, waiting in the blue dusk, in the slow, cold abandonment of her imagination.

____________________

OTHER-WORLDLY

This is no landscape. You are displaced.
Those trees are made of mirrored light.
That dented sky is curved to fool.

Don’t try that handle, it opens a door—

backwards,
into the polished view:
the trees—the lake—the shimmered sky.

 

 

 

An Old Temptation

 

THE MARVELING

The Elephant lives in the stone mountain
that drinks from the sea, its gray eye
as calm as the dry moment that
surrenders to a need—the
lowering blue sky and
endless sea shadow
combine, silence
is the theme,
not a ripple
to declare any
other reason to
see how true the
elephant lives in its
own reality—lost in my
eloquence—I turn from the
knowing of my mind—its joy
for the elephant in its true existence . . .

____________________

CANDLE LIGHT—POEM
WITHOUT ANGER

Flame through crystal
burns in duplicate
becoming two flames.

Tea-candle flame
plays with its own light
in beautiful contortions.

Glass comes to life
as if melting in reverse
to candle flame.

The glass flares.
The glass melts into the flame.
They contain each other.

____________________

SHADES OF BLUE

Let it all become
some other
shade
of blue,
This night
has dreams
too complex to be true,
This night has a need
of something I pursue—
something I thought I knew.
The blue was you.

 

 

 

 The Shadow Of Your Burden

 

MY FOOLISH WAY OF PLEASING YOU

Watch me dance upon the approving air,
holding me aloft
in my pose to charm you,

while you
watch secretly
from under your lashes.

The blue night is soft
with distant moonlight
and the songbirds

have remained—
singing
and out-singing each other,

Help me remember the truth of this
when time
has taken us away from each other.

Look how shadow-memories play
at the edge of our attention—
how quietly the moon goes past the horizon.


(prev. pub. in Medusa’s Kitchen, 7/2/13)

_____________________

FOR ALL YOUR FAILURES

Who is going to love you now,
you old fool, out there in the
rain, pulling off your clothes
and cursing at yourself for
all your failures?

Who is going to drag you in
and hold you to a weather-beaten heart,
be strong as an old tree full of dry music
to make you warm again
and never blame you for your pain?

Who is going to love you
when you grow quiet as a stone
and no longer exclaim
that there is nothing left
of you now to save—

that you are in a floating room
inside yourself
where you complain
that after all the rain and weeping
there is only drought?

 

 

 

Contradictions

 

WE DIE.  GOODBYE.

one after another
we die
we lay our little lives down
on a line
the poor
the famous
the newly born
those who have lived
a hundred years
or more
one after another
in our turn
taking our memories along
our silence
or our song
we die and die and die
and leave the list for others
sad or glad
as suicides
or accidents
or murders
each mother’s child
each atheist
or most religious being
freed of curse
of blessedness
of knowing and of seeing
each priest each fool
and each physician
every mute and sage
and least or best musician
each single song of life
was sung
or never learned
we die
goodbye
we do we still cry
for one another

 

 

 

 This Is Why

 

LONG STEM

withered rose
black against
white page

of poetry,
book of need
finding need

past midnight
dawn waiting
to draw a

conclusion
your words
this is only

the dream you
always mean
to dream

 

 

 

Will You Cry For Me?

 

Today’s LittleNip:

THE FOOLISH QUESTION
—Joyce Odam

“Can unhappiness kill you?”
     “Yes, oh yes.”

“Will I die, then?”
     “Yes, oh yes.”

“Will you cry for me?”
     “Oh yes.”

_______________________

Our Seed of the Week this week (“A Fool’s Errand”) has caused Joyce Odam to send us many poems about the subject, about fools and their doings, foolish and not-so-foolish. Like the stuff of our lives, yes? Though I must admit my errands lean more toward the latter, less toward the former. Thank you, Joyce, for your poems and photos! No fool’s errands here. . .

For Marianne Moore’s “No Swan So Fine”, go to www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/browse?contentId=19821/.

Our new Seed of the Week is “First Flight”. 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. And see every Form Fiddlers’ Friday for poetry form challenges, including those of the Ekphrastic type.

For upcoming poetry events in Northern California and otherwheres, click on UPCOMING NORCAL EVENTS in the links at the top of this page.

______________________

—Medusa

 

 

 

Some play with pebbles, 

others make art.

—Public Domain Photo Courtesy 

of Joe Nolan, Stockton, CA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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.