Hot-Hot-Hot

 

—Poetry by Caschwa, Michael H. Brownstein,
Stephen Kingsnorth, Sayani Mukherjee,
Shiva Neupane, Joe Nolan, and Nolcha Fox
—Public Domain Photos Courtesy
of Joe Nolan

BRIEF BIO
—Caschwa, Sacramento, CA

My expertise as a juggler reveals:
balls, bowling pins, flaming torches,
political ideas, memes, emojis,
acronyms, abbreviations, logos,
all fallen and resting at my feet like
ocean debris at low tide. 

 

 

 

 

 

REAL COFFEE
—Caschwa

I am a REAL coffee drinker
take it black, all the time
imagine if I had a dispute with
those who use creamer;
took out my gun and blasted
away their favorite coffee and
their favorite coffee cup

just sayin’, my marriage to a
person who uses generous
amounts of creamer in her
coffee would not be so strong
after 40 years had I been so
disposed

don’t see any credible reasons
why people can’t just let other
people be other people and not
turn any little differences into
declarations of war

and we can be best buddies at a
pizza parlor if you choose to have
anchovies on your pizza, just don’t
let any of them get on mine! 

 

 

 

 

 

THE MEANING OF MIS-IDENTIFICATION
—Michael H. Brownstein, Jefferson City, MO

I did not come from someplace else—
I came from here
the son of parents who also came from here.
What of it?

Somehow stones on Yom Kippur were
enough—
swallowing people whole,
a garden of sin and a garden of darkness,
a drunk and a prostitute.

Everything degrades:
thoughts of honest mitzvah,
ideologies beyond the compact of one to
another.
Reform becomes stuffing.

Last year for the first time
I thought about Yom Kippur in November,
did not even recall Rosh Hashanah,
and needed real forgiveness—

not a simplicity of stone-skipping across water
or the first line of the Shema,
or how David was not punished for allowing
another
to die for the sake of intimacy.

Twice in my life I did not fast,
I talk aloud to God,
I do not know who I am anymore,
I am not misaligned.

 

 

 

 

A PAUSE ON ANGER
—Michael H. Brownstein

I wake with another Walter Mitty moment,
outside, the sky on fire—Merlin's powers
not strong enough to save the clouds—
Excalibur bent, and nearby,
one tell-tale heart away, her body
splashes into angry disappointment lighting
the final chords of the old-growth forest.
Where is Robin Hood? William Tell?
She ignites the tail of the two cities,
rushes into the foray of the lost child,
and discovers, too late, Black Beauty
can save the little women during the war.
Still there is the abandoned man,
the thrown-away hysteria, the grip of metal,
the degradation of sword and myth,
Venus arriving in a shell full of carcasses,
Thor misjudging his returning hammer
and the blood forms a spider web of deceit
across the embers in the burnt-black sky.
No, nothing was a dream. The tornado,
the large ugly gusts of wind, the huge hail
swept Dorothy from me into the anger
and void of disruption ruptured even more.
Someone has to put out the fires,
but since you are no longer here beside me,
who can it possibly be? I cannot tell.

 

 

 

 

SCAMMER
—Shiva Neupane, Melbourne, Australia

You work harder and harder
and accumulate money in your account
But the scammer deceptively comes through
the digital corridor and takes your money.
 
The scammers are infested
throughout the digital fabric of internet
The vulnerability of people to digital thieves
Is nerve-racking and heart-wrenching.  

 

 

 

 

 

ANOTHER TAKE
—Stephen Kingsnorth, Coedpoeth, Wrexham, Wales

Laughter, at comics, acting camp,
from Panto Dame, to overplayed
as pose—exaggerated style—
long TV-staged, now Mardi Gras.
Though French derived, in British slang,
for former years saw beaten up;
but what-thought-past rears up again.

Yet Shakespeare’s stage was male domain
as women played by lads so dressed,
with Will ‘in Love’, the irony,
his girl dressed as a man to boot;
or As You Like It in the plot,
the boy cast as a girl disguised
to be a man in triple bluff.

As poking fun or laughing with,
our actors unsure how they stand,
or whether vain, director’s cut.
With Mrs Doubtfire, Tootsie too,
the joys of camping scene alive,
or will that Will so soon be banned,
cross-dressing on The Globe be damned?

English kids in families queue
to see the Christmas Pantomime,
where female plays the leading man,
and busty dame, full fronted him.
Are we confused, identities,
misled rampant monstrosities;
or calmly see another’s take? 

 

 

 

 

 

JUST
—Sayani Mukherjee,
Chandannagar, W. Bengal, India

Ever since I was shot down
My battles
I came undone
Madness and Sanity
Bowled over there
There You go
My modern
Alice Cooper dreams
My Jocelyn shirts
My ribcage a thousand sonnets wild
Just My beatnik
My beat of the moment
This is what happens
Even since I was shot down
My battles
My beatnik home
Just My. 

 

 

 

 

 

A PLACE OF NATURE’S PLEADING
—Joe Nolan, Stockton, CA

Flowers grow
From my scalp.
Fruit grows from my palms—
My arms, extended.
My feet have found
A place to root—
A place of nature’s pleading.

My heart expands,
I grow less wary.
Delightful is the feeling
To belong—
Safely gathered in.

Leaning back,
In a chair, I smile,
Noticing the ceiling
That hangs beneath a roof,
Protecting and unyielding.

 

 

 

 

 

LEOPARDS AND SNAKES
—Joe Nolan
 
Watch how leopards
Run from slipping snakes.

Nothing much
To gamble for–-
A little hunger’s slake,
Weighed against
A world of hurt—

Gimpy, swollen leg,
Should things go wrong.

Leopards bear no shame
In moving on.

______________________

Today’s LittleNip:

ROUGHING IT
—Nolcha Fox, Buffalo, WY

My idea of camping out,
away from what I love,
is a Motel 6 room
with no microwave
or refrigerator,
and a black-and-white TV.

______________________

It’s a hot-hot-hot July morning here in Northern California, and our poets are equally hot-hot-hot—our thanks to them for that! Our Seed of the Week was The Joys of Camping;  Stephen Kingsnorth had another take on the word, “camping”… a creative left turn…) 

Be sure to check each Tuesday for the latest Seed of the Week.

NorCal poetry is hoppin’ this week with Modesto Poetry Book Club, Sacramento Poetry Center, Twin Lotus Thai Fourth Tuesdays, an Ekphrastic Poetry Writing Workshop, Poetry Unplugged at Luna’s Cafe, and a reading at Chateau Davell in Camino. Click on Medusa's UPCOMING NORCAL EVENTS (http://medusaskitchen.blogspot.com/p/wtf.html) for details about these and other future poetry events in the NorCal area—and keep an eye on this link and on the Kitchen for happenings that might pop up during the week. Who knows what joys lurk just over the horizon.......?

Some members of Los Escritores del Nuevo Sol are reading at Twin Lotus Thai this coming Tuesday. This is a group of primarily Hispanic writers which has been around Sacramento for a very long time, and which Arturo Mantecon has chosen to chronicle. See https://escritoresdelnuevosol.org/f/a-brief-history-of-escritores-del-nuevo-sol-by-arturo-mantec%C3%B3n?fbclid=IwAR0AFkfO6L8d3rMp5a6bGeTuoA4wUC1R4rW7Vp_NLczLQsGXh_UumTm9Ihc/.

NorCal poets will be saddened to learn that Poet/Storyteller Angela James has passed away. She will be missed.

 

______________________

—Medusa

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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