What Raven Sees

Spider's Time For Skating

 

* * *

—Poetry by Nolcha Fox, Stephen Kingsnorth,
Sayanı Mukherjee, Bianca and Briana Baral,
Caschwa, Joe Nolan, and Taylor Dibbert
—Public Domain Photos Courtesy
of Joe Nolan

 

 

RAVEN
—Nolcha Fox, Buffalo, WY

The raven thinks of everything
he sees as his backyard buffet.
He raids the garbage, bird nests, feeders.
Any living thing can be his haute cuisine.
When food runs short, he’s sure to find
a golf ball, pebbles, metal.
If he can cart it off, it’s his fast food,
he’s anxious for the feast.

 

 

 

 

THE RAVEN, CITE
—Stephen Kingsnorth, Coedpoeth, Wrexham, Wales

Grey beak, sleek sheen, black eyed been
watching twitcher watching him.
Passerine perch, Corvus termed,
jet, yet many charcoal tones.
Making mark through pacing years,
character of searching cheek,
seeking what may let be found,
taunting, flaunting, scene around.

Haggard, gaunt as haunts the ground,
wings spreadeagled, hung then swung,
saunter, careless to be seen,
sent as meant to mystify.
In the script of play and verse,
artful dodgers, rôle or sole,
set to be the mystery,
threat and warning, branch or fly.

Crow, rook, raven—jackdaw close,
magpie near by treasure trove,
one or many, own or team,
masters in their world domain.
Mi-crow-aves their bird encase,
rooks or castles take chess place,
cont-raven-tions bring disgrace,
so get the bird, see beady face.

Grip, Grimm, Poe or Baskin, Hughes,
Aesop’s fabled bird in black,
ark lore, he sees sprig of green,
messenger that floods subside. 

 

 

 

 

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

As the months progress
I surmise a new fall
Flamingo-pink skies
Burning over the horizon
A new Streetlamp hung around my closet
I swam a darkness high
As I breathe deep I drink a new paradise
Hope's cities have new avenues
Before they all fall a decade high
Hung around still for the spring
Matches for matches
This is what justice felt like
Over my running shoes
I knew the darkness has tapestry
So it showed me a matchstick sky
Heaven knows I tried
For the spring comes
With burning winter's sickly delicate lace. 

 

 

 

RIVER
—Sayani Mukherjee

Nature's impish thoughts manifested
A sublime Pinnacle of laid-bare thoughts
A flower smiles when it rains
For it will be drenched forever
Into the autumn pale
The dusk-dawn lies peacefully
The cat musk heaves a playful sigh
When Aurora Borealis dreams open
A new sledge hammer through
By the river upfront
I cried a soothing honeybee
For two more, added beauty
Has been my forte
As the dying river died a peaceful death
For autumn comes a decade’s musing high. 

 

 

 

 Bianca and Briana Bhattarai

—Photo by Barsha Baral

Mum   poem
 —Bianca and Briana Bhattarai,
Melbourne, Australia

Mum you give us courage and pride
We know you are right by our side
You always catch us when we are falling
We know you are not stalling
You do so much for us
You give us telepathy
We know you are right here for us
We always have your company
You always light up our way
Now we are not afraid of anything
Thank you for everything you do for us.

 

 

 

 

FULL MOON
—Caschwa, Sacramento, CA

last night I saw a bright full moon
sitting right between Frustration
and Fury; some referred to it as the
        Wolf Moon

for various and sundry reasons
that my picky brain summarily
discarded as
                      TMI

all these people talking to me
as if I had the memory of a
Dictaphone and could recall
and retrieve every spoken
word I had ever heard
         not on your life

no sir, no ma’am, I am not
that kind of person, I am
still overloaded busy trying
to forget some grade school
lessons they had us commit
by rote repetition
        need I say that again?

that later turned out to be
wrong, false, bad information
so now there is this filter
active in my brain that excludes
most of what I hear
        thank goodness! 

 

 

 

 

A TRIFLING
—Caschwa

it really doesn’t matter
no, not at all, I would
gesture with my hands
but, alas, they are too
big to capture the raw
meagerness of the
apology you have
extended toward me

all that legal mumbo
jumbo, the odds of
winning, must be past
the Stone Age to enter
I gave you the best
numbers of my life!

and that should really
count more than to
get some sassy reply
like “This ticket not a
winner”

My heart and soul!
crumbled up and
discarded in the waste
bin along with used
chewing gum, etc.

and now you are back
asking for more money
and to give you another
chance, like we haven’t
heard that scheme before

well, okay, your beauty
has charmed me, even
if you are phony baloney
I so dream of holding you
in my hands, treasuring
each delightful moment
is that too much to ask? 

 

 

 

Chameleon

OH, SURE
—Caschwa

at the end of the Civil War
our government enacted
laws to abolish slavery

of course, slave owners
were happy to please the
better interests of all in the
nation, so they said, “Oh,
sure, we’ll help you out
with that.”

Today there are few places
in the nation that have to
deal with the problems that
slavery presented

over in Iran, the ancient
model of democratic rule,
they are pretty fussy about
other nations meddling in
how they conduct their
affairs of state

so when some folks asked
our current President to
demand a cease fire in one
of the wars in that region,
of course, Iran could be
expected to reply “Oh, sure,
we’ll help you out with that.”

 

 

 

 

THE LAST DAYS
—Caschwa

this is the first day
of the last 4 days
of January

it is not like we are
running out of water
or of air, or chocolate

but the first month
of the new year
is coming to a close

do we celebrate?
we could do that by
just taking extra naps

personally, the weather
or not forecast directs
me to fire up the BBQ

filled the propane tank
a few gallons for a
bunch of dollars

not a cowboy
don’t have the hat
I go shopping

let someone else
round up the herd
butcher the meat

set it out for sale
in the supermarket
where I go shopping

that works for me
it works for them
win, win

 

 

 

 

HOW BLUE IS YOUR BLUE?
—Joe Nolan, Stockton, CA

How deep is your
Being in blue?
How much do you rue
What you must do,
Just to get along?

How blue did you
Sing your song?
Which of your lyrics
Lingered on,
When you’d walked away
From your duties of the day?

Blue is not just a color.
It’s also its own wave of being,
When things that can’t be let go,
Linger on,
Like lyrics of a song
You regret ever singing,
To a loved-one who went away,
Because of what you had to say,
That she could not accept.

It’s too easy to say
She did reject
You
And all that you held dear—
The one you
Loved so much, who
Refused to hold you near
Once she really knew
You.

 

 

 

 

PERPETUAL SLAVERY
—Joe Nolan

There is something
We’re trying to win
Between flesh and skin,
Between vain emotion
And the history of our kin.

Seeing places
We’ve not seen before—
Pleasures yet unknown,
Happiness that runs the seam
Of brain into bone.

Who could ever redeem us
From being assigned
To the back of the bus,
Depending on our skin,

After a thousand years of slavery,
Deprivation and disgrace,
As though we didn’t deserve
Our place in the human race?

 

How shall we overcome
What has, thus, been done,
Over thousands of years—
Our children born in tears,
From what our masters won
From our flesh—
Servants to refresh,
In perpetual slavery? 

 

 

 

IN CLOSE-QUARTERS FOR THE WINTER
—Joe Nolan

One month into Winter,
Skies have disappeared,
Behind clouds that linger,
Throughout this time of year.

Christmas was just the beginning
Of our time of Winter cheer,
When cold, rain, snow and fog
Obliged us to be near,
With our near and dear ones,
In close-quarters for the heat,
Conversation and
Trying to feel complete.

 

 

 

MELTING GLACIERS
—Joe Nolan

Let’s melt a glacier.
Here we go—
Let warm sun
Shine on snow.

Little by little,
Day to day,
Snow will melt
And go away.

When it’s gone
We’ll plant a field,
Hoping for
Enormous yield.

It’s like this
Every year,
Back where
I grew up.

We had four months of
Snow on the ground,
Like Winter would
Never give up.

___________________

Today’s LittleNip:

NOTABLE
—Taylor Dibbert, Washington, D.C.

One notable aspect of
The in-laws from hell
Is that they
Almost certainly
Have no idea
How terrible
They actually are.

___________________

Many thanks to today’s contributors, and welcome back to Taylor Dibbert. Taylor is a writer, journalist, and poet in Washington, DC. Invictus, his debut poetry collection, was published in January and is available at https://www.amazon.com/Invictus-Taylor-Dibbert/dp/B0CQ5K3SN8/.

 

 

 

Our Seed of the Week was “What Raven Sees”, and Nolcha Fox and Stephen Kingsnorth have grabbed ahold of the theme with their sharp beaks and made the most of it. Be sure to check each Tuesday for the latest Seed of the Week.

We have some guests today from Australia: Bianca and Briana Bhattarai sent their poem  with the help of their neighbor, SnakePal Shiva Neupane, and I have posted it exactly as it came to me. Like Shiva, the girls are originally from Nepal. Welcome to the Kitchen, Blanca and Briana, and don’t be strangers!

It’s time for this year's submissions to VOICES from Cold River Press. This year is a special memorial issue for recently-passed Norcal Poet D.R. Wagner, though the theme remains "ANOMALIES, PATHOLOGIES, AND PARADISE". Any material directly relating to D.R. outside of the theme will be accepted and is greatly encouraged. Please send in your poems, fiction, artwork, and photography to submissions@coldriverpress.com. Standard submission guidelines apply. Deadline for submissions is May 1st, 2024. For more info, go to https://www.coldriverpress.com/HTML/VOICES/voices.htm/.

 

 

 

Valentine’s Day brings out the poetry, and this week we have plenty of poetry events in the NorCal area: two workshops on Thursday (one in Cameron Park and one at Verge in Sacramento); a reading on Friday at Stories on Stage of work by Josh Fernandez, Frank Gioia and Philip Jacques; then on Saturday Nevada County’s Kick-Off Party in Nevada City; Mosaic of Voices in Stockton; plus Escritores del Nuevo Sol’s Elixir of Love, and Love Jones Vibe, both in Sacramento. 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.

 

The February issue of Sacramento Poetry Center's Poet News is now available at https://www.sacpoetrycenter.org/poetnews/. Check it out for area poetry events (including the Bay Area), poetry, submissions, workshops and more!

____________________

—Medusa

 

 

 

 Monday Blues...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A reminder that, in addition to
this week’s listings above,
Sacramento Poetry Center will
feature Eureka Poets Laureate
Wil Gibson and Harvey Gray Mitchell
tonight, 7:30pm.
For info about this and other
upcoming poetry happenings in
Northern California and otherwheres,
click on
UPCOMING NORCAL EVENTS
(http://medusaskitchen.blogspot.com/p/wtf.html)
in the links at the top of this page—
and keep an eye on this link and on
the daily Kitchen for happenings
that might pop up
—or get changed!—
 during the week.

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.

Find previous four-or-so posts by scrolling down
under today; or there's an "Older Posts" button
at the bottom of this column; or find previous poets
by typing the name of the poet or poem
 into the little beige box at the top
left-hand side of today’s post; or go to
Medusa’s Rapsheet at the bottom of
the blue column at the right
 to find the date you want.

Would you like to be a SnakePal?
Guidelines are at the top of this page
at the Placating the Gorgon link;
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—
and collaborations are welcome.
Just remember:
the snakes of Medusa are always hungry—
for poetry, of course!

 

How blue is your blue?