Flight Skill of the Starlings

 Flock of Starlings

—Poetry by Kushal Poddar, Kolkata, W. Bengal, India
—Photos Courtesy of Public Domain

 

 

A FLOCK OF DECEASED AVIANS

A flock of deceased avians
flies out of habit in the phosphorus sky
during the defensive air strike.

You could have chosen a worse
situation to aver your love, but not many.
You feel—it is either this or being erased
without the memories' traces.

What do memories do sans any
physical avenue to convey or a storage
to stay? Do they counter-blast
in another realm where the energies
we have are orphaned live?

 

 

 

 

I SMELL A RAT

We have an agreement not to smell
the house, but I do. I sniff the rot,
vomit, repeat, as if by some forbidden design.

The other night I imagined balancing
on a narrow strip of dusty flowers, alive
albeit born old, the kind they use
to make a road divider feel pretty.

The odour is not so mild. It slaps
your senses if you let it so, but we
agreed to ignore, and I erase my sign on
that agreement. The smell shapes a rat.

It makes you imagine the poisoned meatballs.
I feel like bees' knees for death.
You whisper that's why we need
those terms on the treaties with life,
conscience, comfort and demise.

 

 

 

AT THE APOLITICAL GATHERING

The procession ends near
the five-streets crossing.
They talk, shout, and then
after the slogans slow down
the leaders orate, make Tim
sweat, and nervously he shakes
his head. Soon the listeners
not one with the piazza and mass
can hear the words they fight against.
The dark and white words, erased
by one and stressed by another,
the smoke you need, comrade, and
the world doesn't ashen the sky.
The slate holds the flight skill
of the starlings. Tim shakes his head.
They will understand the grey
between the amber and the onyx.
They should stop talking. Some songs
will be great. I grin, open a random line
from the newspaper, and begin singing.

 

 

 

FEVERISH CONCERNS

In this depth some moments
gasp, sink senseless, but then
on the floor of the fever I find
the remnants of sunken memories.
Those ships have sailed. I scream.
You hear a cricket, a wind leaving
my mouth.
On the mast
of my hearing an incessant starling
counts time. The bed of my dreams
soaks sweat. The raising sea level
concerns my conscience. The saline bed
rustles, "Are you worthy of your salt?"

 

 

 

 

21-GUN SALUTES AND
HEMINGWAY SYNDROME

August smothers the voice,
rain and only rain has the right
to colonize the colloquy.

Between twenty-one-gun salutes
for a colonel no one knows about
and one in my mouth, invisible though—
I do not own one, rain types on the roof,
'The constitution of a brainless reign.'

You begin a sentence with, "My country
may not be" and I thwart you, gurgle,
"Never be apologetic about the beauty
of your beloved" through my muzzle-
muffled orifice.

 

 

 

 

COME, SEE WITH ME

The sight is only a part of seeing.
A blind knows the other.
If you see a blind man,
hold his hand and ask,

said my uncle. Before he lost
his vision he withered,
and one day I went for
his hand to stir him awake;
he crumbled into whits.

This night when they set
their dogs after our candlelight
peace, our canvas shoes marching,
I close my eyes to see my uncle
writing a poster with his ashes,
'I UNDERSTAND.'

 

 

 

DRIVING BACK FROM NATURE

We drive back
the way we went,
crossed the treeline, pedestals,
steeples and the graveyard.

Near the last of the dense foliage
I need a toilet break.
You drum the steering wheel softly.

We shall drive back as soon I finish.
I hold on to my last drops.
The urine mist, dew drops on
the blades of green, plays Lacrimosa,
Mozart, chorus. I linger on the moment.
We shall drive back then.

 

 

 

 

IMMUNITY

In the pediatric ward
those faded toys for her oblivion
and her ever-smiling doctor,

the invisible needle
and a momentary pinch,
an innocent shriek, and then
a sticker and a toffee,
all to make her feel special, and these

she recalls on her wedding day
one Spring, almost too hot to marry.

As her parent, I raise a glass
and sip the hope that this
will immunize her for the life,
for the grief.

____________________

Today’s LittleNip:

The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis.

—Dante Alighieri

____________________

—Medusa, welcoming Kushal Poddar back to the Kitchen with his fine poems today!

 

Please let me know if you can read the tiny poem on the orange photo above. I can't make it out, but I liked the picture so well I decided to post it anyway.

 

 

 

 

A reminder that another MoSt
summer workshop meets today
in Modesto, 1pm; and the
Words for Wynter fundraiser
takes place starting at 2pm
at the Sacramento Poetry Center.
For info about these and other
future 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!

SnakePal’s friend, the starling

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Craving Lobster in the Foothills

—Poetry and Photos by Taylor Graham,
Placerville, CA
—And then scroll down for
Form Fiddlers’ Friday, with poetry by
Claire J. Baker, Joe Nolan, Nolcha Fox,
Stephen Kingsnorth, Caschwa,
Christina Chin, and Jerome Berglund

 

 

PASTORAL WITH DOE

‘Tis the darkling hour, gloaming
when the puma may be roaming
with the mists and shadows falling.
Birds in trees their bed-songs calling,
shelterless the fences standing—
look above for cougar’s landing.

 

 

 

 

LAUDS

Again the night has ferried us to dawn.
The cat is begging for his breakfast
though his dish is full.
I expect he’s craving lobster
as a feline’s due.
I leave him to his grousing
and walk out the door to morning.
What bird’s singing,
unseen in the brush? It must be
spotted towhee, warbling
the redemption of another day.

 

 

 

 

JUST A DAY HIKE

I don’t need a nephelometer,
though half the joy of upcountry is clouds
building a storm, Thor’s dark moods
athwart a landscape of uplift and corrade.
I don’t expect a jolter, tectonics
in the long reach of time.
This is simply a day hike, going light.
I don’t need a sumpter, just my dog,
good boots, a tracking stick,
canteen and sandwich for the trail.
I’ll look for calochortus and lupine,
mule-ears, tower-delphinium, columbine.
I won’t stay long enough to see them
desiccate, fade, and decline.

 

 

 

 

DESOLATION

    leash-laws in Wilderness, 1986

Must I hike lonely in the wild
without my scout-companion
coming to call from running free—
dog of keener senses than my own,
her boundless joy off-lead?

And so we patrolled that summer
in a more permissive wilderness—
granite and lava, talus and scree,
thundercloud, wind and raven,
and mountain chickadee.

 

 

 

 

DESOLATE LIKE DEAD?

At Milepost 31—inside the extreme burn-
scar from fire three summers ago—
I hear no birdsong. A great winged shadow
passes high over earth churned by dozers
in the fire-fight. Sunflower, groundsel,
and prettyface are blooming now.
In a sheltered spot, a stringer of incense-
cedar and lodgepole pine survives.
Right beside the paved 2-lane
with Memorial Day traffic rushing by,
a burned-out-stump is almost hidden
under its vibrant green sprouts—Black Oak.
And here’s a ladybug doing her pollinator-
business, and a lone bee scouts
this wilderness for the future of its hive.

 

 

 

A FIRE PLACE IN THE BURN SCAR

What brought them to this desolated ridge
cut thru by highway traffic, to stop right here
to make a camp? Did they build this fire pit
of rocks? Not just a fire circle; a walled
construction like a dome with center open
to the sky. Rough tree-trunk bench,
a stump for stool, three walking sticks
leaned against it. Are they the ones
who carefully planted a few seedling pines
in charred moonscape?
I imagine them sitting at their fire-place
at the end of their workday here,
watching a kindled flame safe inside
the walls they built, as afternoon
turned evening, and sun dropped into ocean.
Then the dark, its seas of stars igniting
pin-pricks of fire so many light-
years passed away.

____________________

Today’s LittleNip:

FALLEN TREE BLOCKS DRIVEWAY
—Taylor Graham

All our everyday
headaches, breakdowns, challenges
on this piece of land—
now see how effortlessly
vulture sails without wingbeats.

____________________

Our Seed of the Week was Desolation, and Taylor Graham’s poems and photos present a bleak landscape after the fires, that's for sure. Still, the critters in her poems are busy putting their lives together in spite of it all. Thanks, TG!

Forms TG has used today include a Little-Used Words Poem (“Just a Day Hike”); a Word-Can Poem (“Lauds”); a Rhymed Sestet that is also a response to Medusa's Ekphrastic Challenge last week, as well as being a Pastoral (“Pastoral with Doe”); and a Tanka (“Fallen Tree Blocks Driveway”). TG says that the little-used or unfamiliar word prompt came from a poet in the Georgetown Library workshop awhile back.

Writers whose mailing address is within El Dorado County are encouraged to submit to Slope and Basin literary journal before its Oct. 1 deadline. Info may be found at https://artsandcultureeldorado.org/slope-and-basin/.

El Dorado County’s has a regular schedules of workshops, weekly and otherwise—go to http://medusaskitchen.blogspot.com/p/wtf.html, or see Taylor Graham’s Western Slope El Dorado Poetry on Facebook at www.facebook.com/ElDoradoCountyPoetry/. Also see Lara Gularte’s Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/groups/382234029968077/. (Poetry is Gold in El Dorado County!) And of course you can always click on Medusa's UPCOMING NORCAL EVENTS (http://medusaskitchen.blogspot.com/p/wtf.html) for details about future poetry events in the NorCal area.

And now it’s time for…  


FORM FIDDLERS’ FRIDAY! 

  

It’s time for more contributions from Form Fiddlers, in addition to those sent to us by Taylor Graham! Each Friday, there will be poems posted here from our readers using forms—either ones which were sent to Medusa during the previous week, or whatever else floats through the Kitchen and the perpetually stoned mind of Medusa. If these instructions are vague, it's because they're meant to be. Just fiddle around with some challenges—  Whaddaya got to lose… ? If you send ‘em, I’ll post ‘em! (See Medusa’s Form Finder at the end of this post for resources and for links to poetry terms used in today’s post.)


Check out our recently-refurbed page at the top of Medusa’s Kitchen called, “FORMS! OMG!!!” which expresses some of my (take ‘em or leave 'em) opinions about the use of forms in poetry writing, as well as listing some more resources to help you navigate through Form Quicksand and other ways of poetry. Got any more resources to add to our list? Send them to kathykieth@hotmail.com for the benefit of all man/woman/poetkind!

* * *

Last Week’s Ekphrastic Photo

Last week’s photo brought Ekphrastic response-poems from Claire J. Baker, Joe Nolan, Nolcha Fox, Stephen Kingsnorth, and Caschwa, with some sly references to our local doe and her recent tomato-thefts:


ANOTHER DAWNING
—Claire J. Baker, Pinole, CA

Look past your guilt, our grieving boy:
it’s dawn on heaven’s country road—
and spring again with bordering grass,
a friendly fence intact or mostly.
And nothing of the scene seems ghostly.

Look again, Tom Sawyer, the fawn
who’s life you leveled as it leaped
now pads along a hide-brown lane
that melds with earth, a mellow sky
where angels juggle who and why.

* * *

ENCOUNTER WITH THE DEER-GODDESS
—Joe Nolan, Stockton, CA

I’m here now.

I hope you haven’t
Had to wait too long?

The road is narrow
And stretches back
All the way to the sun
From which I have come,
But my legs are strong
So I was able to make it.

I’ve come all this way
For what you have to say.

I have big ears.
I listen well.

What is it
You wanted to tell
Me?

Oh, yes,
I AM BAMBI,
The Deer-Goddess. 

* * *

AT SUNRISE
—Nolcha Fox, Buffalo, WY

She walks the path
in golden haze,
taking no offense
that fences fence
her morning walk
and guide her
to the tasty treats
she’ll feast on
when the fence
posts end,
and she enjoys
her freedom.

* * *

DOLEFUL
—Stephen Kingsnorth, Coedpoeth, Wrexham, Wales
    
Now know that sunrise time of day  
for see, if missed, fog’s dewdrop trees—  
till sunset dusk this misted way?   

The burning gold will heat grey clay,     
bring thaw to soil and melt its freeze;
now know that sunrise time of day.  

That ear pricked doe, how long will stay
before our scent sent by the breeze,
till sunset dusk this misted way?   

By fencing, how pray did it stray      
to meet this stranger, lens it sees?
Now know that sunrise time of day.  

Would nature lovers keep away?              
Perhaps I should say doleful please—       
till sunset dusk this misted way?    

May they hear near my bleats, and weigh
these carpe diem pleas, me seize?
Now know that sunrise time of day—
till sunset dusk this misted way?

* * *

DAWN VS. DUSK
—Caschwa, Sacramento, CA

poor little fawn
must have missed class
when compass points
were explained

now lost in time
lost in space
on road once traveled

did remember the
lesson to shield your
eyes from the sun

so must be on
right track now
just a little further
ahead will be
feast and family

eyes ready to see
ears ready to hear
snout ready to munch

behind her that one
frightening misstep
when she was chased

out of Medusa’s garden
with a mouthful of
luscious tomatoes

* * *

Here is an EP Johnson Quintet, one of last week’s Triple-F Challenges, from Carl Schwartz (Caschwa): 

 

 

 

DIDN’T KNOW THAT THEN
—Caschwa

junior college in German class
a cute blonde girl sat right next to me
she lit the sky, anyone could see
successful girl as she hoped to be
admiration of all the class

she was Homecoming princess girl
which seemed impressive for just a teen
but trouble waited behind the scene
a host of rules that were harsh and mean
she had less human rights as girl

by herself she could not conduct
a business deal without male co-sign
a mere checking account, not fine
nor a charge card with credit line
this was barred-by-the-law conduct

it was not until laws saw change
in 1974 this fact
some legislation would pass an Act
to give our women the rights they lacked
without their plans kept barred from change

* * *

Carl also sent us a Haiku Chain:

 

 

 

MISSING IN PLAIN SIGHT
—Caschwa

people sometimes say
there’s not a cloud in the sky
so where did they go?

they probably head
for perplexing issues where
clarity is rare

clouds are right at home
wherever adults convene
to sort out the facts

you won’t see them at
committee meetings among
all the dirt tossed up

but they’re hard at work
shielding humans from the truth
so much we don’t see

there’s that cloud of dust
when we empty our vacuum
cleaner bag at home

and floaters in eyes
too busy to recognize
all such distortions

clouds are all around
in various shapes and forms
our minds make it so

* * *

In response to our Desolation SOW, Carl sent us this poem that used three Octets, in which each line rhymes with the corresponding line in the previous Octet. In other words, abcdef abcdef abcdef:

 

 

 

NO SALE
—Caschwa

this is not just a wish
it is a compulsion
I MUST have that candy bar!
I have all the right coins and
some good, clean, crisp singles
there is no reason in the whole
wide world why I can’t just
complete this one transaction

this machine is a fish
no human compassion
other-worldly from afar
sanity not in the brand
old AI with shingles
not suited to please any soul
sure am tempted to bust
but my moves add no traction

this is not a fine dish
from across the ocean
or wicked like a low par
that is so close to the sand
mouth opens and tongue tingles
quite opposite from lump of coal
hands are clean, free of dust
I’d settle for a fraction

* * *

Jerome Berglund and Christina Chin collaborated on three poems for us this week. The lines in italics are by Jerome, and the others are by Christina. The first two poems are in the form of the Tan-Renga:

 

 

 

incessant chirps
on the street wires
arriving sparrows

bringing glad tidings
from somewhere else


* * *

gravitas

full of pomp
she talks herself
out of the job

turns pockets out 

spotty raspberries
letters home
from higher ground

and dumps into guitar case

he asks
for the last dance

* * *


And here is a Split Sequence from Christina and Jerome: 


 

 

shelf stable

a bag
of barley bursts
and spills

he discards the livery 


descamisados
calligraphy
with the cat's tail

but leaves watch on

unable to erase
the tattooed crest


* * *

Stephen Kingsnorth sent an Ekphrastic poem based on this photo he found—is it also an Ars Poetica? 

 

 

 

 —Public Domain Photo Courtesy of
Stephen Kingsnorth

WELL EARTHED
—Stephen Kingsnorth
    
They’re not word pictures in themselves,
so why string words amongst the leaves—
unless a book, words in print, or
illuminated manuscript?
A plant, like shortcut by police,
false evidence, signed statement made—
to stake environmental claim
by neon blue amongst the green?
Here’s tracery of trickery,
a mockery, black metal branch
arising, writing on the wall.
Highlighting what we want to say—
graffiti in a modern spray
seen apposite, appropriate—
but hanging vines of gangly wires
all dropping to boxed battery?
Unless the context of our text
supports, does not deny the line,
philosophy seems wisdom lost.
One hopes the project is well earthed.

* * *

And last week we posted this photo; this week, Charles Mariano of Sacramento devised a caption for it. A poetry of sorts, captions are…

 

 

 Okay, which one of you guys is mine…

___________________

Many thanks to today’s writers for their lively contributions! Wouldn’t you like to join them? All you have to do is send poetry—forms or not—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!

___________________

TRIPLE-F CHALLENGES! 

 

See what you can make of these challenges, and send your results to kathykieth@hotmail.com/. (No deadline.) There’s gold to be found in a Golda:

•••Golda: https://poetscollective.org/poetryforms/gold
 

•••AND/OR follow the lead of Christina Chin and Jerome Berglund and put together a Split Sequence:

•••Split Sequence: http://www.hsa-haiku.org/frogpond/2022-issue45-1/essay.html

 

•••AND/OR try yet another version of the Haiku, the Abbreviated, sometimes known as a Miku:

•••Abbreviated Haiku (Miku): https://poetscollective.org/poetryforms/abbreviated-haiku

•••See also the bottom of this post for another challenge, this one an Ekphrastic one.

•••And don’t forget each Tuesday’s Seed of the Week! This week it’s “Work”.

____________________

MEDUSA’S FORM FINDER: Links to poetry terms mentioned today:

•••Ars Poetica: www.poetryfoundation.org/learn/glossary-terms/ars-poetica
•••Ekphrastic Poem: notesofoak.com/discover-literature/ekphrastic-poetry
•••EP Johnson Quintet: https://poetscollective.org/poetryforms/epjohnson-quintet
•••Golda: https://poetscollective.org/poetryforms/gold
•••Little-Used Words Poem: A poem incorporating some words which are uncommon in regular usage

•••Octet: eight-line stanza
•••Pastoral Poetry: poets.org/glossary/pastoral AND/OR 4thstcog.com/theology/what-are-the-characteristics-of-pastoral-poetry.html AND/OR www.masterclass.com/articles/poetry-101-what-is-a-pastoral-poem-learn-about-the-conventions-and-history-of-pastoral-poems-with-examples/, A short pastoral poem is called an Eclogue (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eclogue), also an Idyll or a Madrigal.
•••Sestet, Rhymed: A six-line poem, each line rhyming with the others
•••Split Sequence: http://www.hsa-haiku.org/frogpond/2022-issue45-1/essay.html
•••Tanka: poets.org/glossary/tanka
•••Tan-renga: https://www.graceguts.com/essays/an-introduction-to-tan-renga
•••Word-Can Poem: putting random words on slips of paper into a can, then drawing out a few and making a poem out of them

___________________

—Medusa

 

 

 

 Today's Ekphrastic Challenge!
 
 Make what you can of today's
picture, and send your poetic results to
kathykieth@hotmail.com/. (No deadline.)

* * *

—Public Domain Photo

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For future 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!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Translations of Color

 —Poetry by Michael H. Brownstein,
Jefferson City, MO
—Public Domain Artwork Courtesy of Medusa

 

 

THE COLORS OF LOVE
 
"It's right that I should care about you
and try to make you happy when you're blue”*—
but blue is also a color of love,
azure, emerald, Antigua:
Take this sapphire in your hand
and squeeze it as hard as you can.
Can you feel my heart pounding,
the reddish liquid inside me gaining heat,
rose, maple leaves in autumn,
the sunset over Key West,
rich carmine with a splash of crimson?
Purple, too, talks the language of love,
violet knows how to translate it,
orange ripens the air smoothing everything,
yellow has the kiss of the sun,
white the hug of the moon,
green the blessing of evergreen,
and brown, yes, brown comfortable and soft,
the complexion of foothills rising to mountains,
fertile soil and exactly what is needed for growing:
Too many colors of love, but me,
I'm happily in love with every shade of you.
 
*from Vanilla Fudge 

 

 

 

 
MEDITATION

I need to pause for a moment beneath great oak,
let the nester of sunshine sift through its heavy limbs
and lather me with blossoms.
                                         A soft pillowed breeze,
down-beat of cicada, ballet of tall grass, leaf-work,
the translations of the color green in wind and light.
                                         a line of ants and leaf.

 

 

 

 

MY WIFE AND I BECOME A PART OF
WHITE PINES INDIAN RESERVATION

The hurt and pain is starting to become a norm 

here. We had 4 suicides in two days all young 

men. 2 by hanging and 2 by gun shot to the head.
        —Tiny, our mentor in her homeland—
        the Sioux Nation, White Pines, South Dakota,
        in a text message to my wife


so it goes beyond belonging
tall grass and feral dogs
unpaved roads and thick back country
some buffalo and some buffalo bones
a score of litter within the park

and so it goes beyond educating
a body of politics and badlands
the rattlesnake on the cliff
a bobcat in the field of elk
a score of racism at its borders

 

 

 

A WEATHER REPORT

Summer came to Mid-Missouri in February,
eighty degrees for more than a week.
Someone said, If you don't like the weather,
wait an hour and it will change.
It did not change, the sky boring blue,
and every now and then a lisp of white,
a wagon train of clouds, blue and more blue,
the great shadow of turkey vultures.

 

 

 

 

INTO THE LIGHT

We left after supper,
the summer sun still high,
traveled south towards the gulf,
her head resting easily on my shoulder,
her hand folded in her lap,
and I drove to Louisiana into darkness,
she sleeping with a great smile
and i drove down the highway
safe and well, the darkening sky
growing thicker and thicker
until I wondered if there had ever been a sun.
Early the next day I thought I saw dawn,
but it was only lights from somewhere else
and I allowed that false dawn to multiply
into a dozen false dawns.
She did not wake. She didn't snore.
She didn't stop smiling.
and even when we pulled into
gas stations, she held her place
waiting for my shoulder's return.
The sun did arrive finally,
she did wake, stretch, ask where we were,
and I could not answer, not knowing.
I drove through the morning's sunlight
and we arrived at the edge of a swamp.
She knew the place, gave directions,
and it seemed everyone was waiting for us.
I don't remember ever being that hungry,
that tired, that wide awake
and we did not sleep until hours later,
the road still in my head,
the worry the sun had forgotten us,
and that night the largest moon
I had ever seen rose over the swamp
and we listened to the music of insects,
birds and all of the creatures
living at its edge, deep in their thoughts.

________________________

Today’s LittleNip:

I try to apply colors like words that shape poems, like notes that shape music.

—Joan Miro

________________________

—Medusa, with thanks to Michael Brownstein for today’s fine poetry!

 

 

 

 “Purple, too, talks the language of love…”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For future 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!

 

 

Serpent Songs

 —Poetry by Joan McNerney, Ravena, NY
—Public Domain Visuals Courtesy of Medusa

 

 

FORGOTTEN LANDSCAPE


I am driving down a hill without name
on an unnumbered highway.
This road transforms into a snake
winding around hair pin turns.
See how it hisses though this long night.

Why am I alone?
At the bottom of the incline
lies a dark village. Strangely hushed
with secrets. How black it is. How difficult
to find what I must discover.
My fingers are tingling.


Smoke combs the air, static fills night.

Continuing to cross gas-lit streets
encountering dim intersections.
Another maze. One line leads to another. 


Dead ends become beginnings.

Listening to lisp of the road.
My slur of thoughts sink as snake rasps grow
louder. See how the road slithers.
What can be explored? Where can it be? 



 

All is in question.

 

 

 

LUCK

Wearing designer clothes
and sleek jewelry,
she traipses along willy-nilly
throwing golden kismet
wherever whimsy calls.

Some think luck chooses their
goodness or hard work. Perhaps
they were blessed at birth?

The wise know luck wears a
visor tripping over herself
favoring both mean and lazy.

Luck has a toxic twin called
misfortune covered with
gloom. Dressed in dusty
rags, stupor-like he selects
unsuspecting victims.

Stomping helter skelter
clutching the throats of
both meek and mighty.

Everybody who gets in his way
will be pushed down, their
muffled cries barely heard.

 

 

 

 

SEE TROUBLE GROW

Trouble is patient


hiding around corners,


creeping through shadows


entering without a sound.

It starts as a seed blown


by careless winds and


covers your garden with


foul brackish weeds.

Or sparks from a match


spread over fertile ground


becoming flames speeding


through the long night.

Trouble knows where you live.


You cannot hide from it.


Gaining a foothold, growing


fat feeding on your flesh.

Watch how trouble grows


inch by inch, molecule


by molecule coursing


through your veins.

Trouble begins as a whisper


day by day growing louder.

Stronger than your heartbeat

becoming a thumping drum.

Soon you will forget


there was a time


when trouble was not


living by your side.

 

 

 

 

LAST CHANCE

You must come before 9 p.m.
(miracles can be quirky)
to the highway drug store
where pristine pharmacists
feed scripts into forked
tongues of computers.

Neat rows of sterile packs
and crutches wait attentively.
Herbal medicines, vitamins
pose with gleaming lotions.

One squat wobbly table
marked “Last Chance”
offers up my cure. I must
salvage a phenomenon now.
Here is a miracle I can believe in.

A tinted jar of aroma therapy
filled with flowers grown in California.
To be cuddled safely under my coat
taken home far from fists of winds.

My glass bottle of jasmine mist...
pink, yellow, white petals.
Night-blooming jasmine
whispering perfumed nothings
at the 11th hour.

____________________

Today’s LittleNip:

BEWARE
—Joan McNerney

If you touch Medusa
her serpents will wrap
themselves around you.
She soars through water
with giant wings, gold fins.
Hundreds of snakes

crawling from her head.


Some long to be near
Medusa to hear her hissing
lisping songs forgetful.
She can suck blood from
throats coiling minds
past infinity before
they breathe again.

_____________________

—Medusa, welcoming Joan McNerney back to the Kitchen, with thanks for today’s fine, fun poetry!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For future 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!

LittleSnake and Crew

 

 

 

 

 

 

An Envy of Shadows

Secrecy

 

* * *

 

—Poetry by Joyce Odam and Robin Gale Odam,
Sacramento, CA
—Visuals by Joyce Odam

 

 

DISCARNATE
—Joyce Odam

Out of the harsh landscape comes the lone shadow,
out of the gray stone,
out of the gray hour—the vanishing sky—

the bodiless shadow, so lost there is no place for it,
only this desolation, this astounding wilderness—
no creature or vegetation, no line of horizon

or relief of water—nothing here but the slow
shadow,
displaced from its life, or its dream, or only created
for the duration of this poem.


(prev. pub. in Medusa’s Kitchen, 8/2/16; 11/8/22; 1/16/24)

 

 

 

When

 

THE DESOLATION
 —Joyce Odam

Here is where the lonely bring
their lucid prayers to face the four
directions with devotion to the soul
and charm the gods with their surrender.

The hills roll out
toward the far blue mountains—
the churning skies beyond—where
all the winds assail with all the forces.

The lonely ones are pure of spirit now,
nothing will fail or harm them,
they know how to plead,
they learn to love.

 

 

 

Past The Hour

 

 

RENDERED
 —Robin Gale Odam
After a mural on a cement wall

first I was a sketch of art
large upon a wall of light
rare of charm, unrivaled, full

then it was that part of me
was fallen, ruinous, unchaste
never one for enmity

take the concrete canvas up
bash it with a wrecking ball
that my bittered heart can go 

 

 

 

In The Dream

AN ENVY OF SHADOWS
—Joyce Odam

And in the room were light shards—who chose all
the forms to be, the pierce against cold, the very
dance of mystery from an old nerve of response
and as giddy? I was lifted through the glass as if it
were not there—not window—not chandelier. I
was dance with dance, and light with light. The
room blazed again as before, Shadows ceased to 

be. I could not name the colors : jewel tones, 

exotic blends, no color, one color, fragmenting the 

room into a clash of exploding brilliance. There 

was no room now for anything to regain its same-

ness, though the surface quivered back at once—

like a hallucination turning back into sanity.

                                                                 
(prev. pub. in Medusa’s Kitchen, 5/7/19) 

 

 

 

As Is

 

 
EVEN HERE
—Joyce Odam

Even here, among
  the forgotten
    shadows,
      histories,
        and rumors;

even here,
  among the cold
    reverberating echoes
      that quarreled still,

it became the place
  we knew to look
    for landmarks and
      long-ago addresses;

we were the ones it
  longed to have return,
    this place of perfect
      desolation.

We were its old inhabitants –
  prodigals of time, and we
    were weary—weary—
      and ready to surrender.

Yes, here…yes, here
  is where we would rest…
     perhaps stay.


(prev. pub. in Poets’ Forum, December 1996)

 

______________________

ON THE WATER
—Robin Gale Odam

lotus flowers, yellow as a memory,
and you—young in the green shade of
her umbrella, in the long canoe drifting on

the water—you, pining for a glimpse of the
dark fishes circling in the shadows of the
lotus, in the shade of her confessions—

you, the sister of my mother’s solitude,
and her confessing the path of the fishes,
into the shade of the lotus, around the
shadows, and out of the dream

 

 

 

The Unknowable

 

 

GODS OF A HUNDRED ILLUSIONS
—Joyce Odam

Angels flutter their wings
In their transparency
I see them

or is that an error of human imagination :
what are gods without angels
angels without gods

but I see them from the hundred windows
that my mind creates,   believes,   denies,
these spellings of illogical truth.

I feel the chill at my back
and turn around to the disconnection
of a receding, dispassionate landscape.


(prev. pub. in Medusa’s Kitchen, 1/22/19) 

 

 

 

The Old Diary
 

 SUNLIGHT KISS THE SHADE
—Robin Gale Odam
After Christina's World by Andrew Wyeth, 1948

In the ruins of promises,
all the raspy words are behind me—
deftly you slipped away, just as I caught
my breath.

And now I sit in a doorway,
my back to a darkened room, unable to
remember what I would have said.

 

 

 

Close The Book

 

VANITIES AND DESOLATIONS
—Joyce Odam

1. It was only the slow sleep into the waft of sur-
render, the fluttering curtain at the doorway, pulled
for quiet, the way the light remembers here, to lie
quietly against the floor where a prone figure, in
one of its spells, faces the rigidity of anguish.

2. A soft singing emanates from somewhere and
thins into some listener’s reluctance to believe such
sounds can be bestowed—perhaps the guilt of rev-
erie, or the way some hand is muffled over a mouth.

3. It was always so—this used tableau, soliloquy
and melodrama, written for someone to say into an
admiring talent for such things. Note how subtle
becomes the turn of telling, how now the very ex-
istence of light is challenged by the fall of a heavy
curtain upon which a marvelous scene is playing
between acts.

4. And elsewhere—oh, elsewhere, the dissolving
begins. The bit of light is swept away and its gold
dust rises into the folds of the curtain. A great hol-
lowing absorbs the last echo and the sweet voices
are no more. The listener must now remember all
it can of this, because it’s over and the storyteller
has fallen asleep in the chair, and sometimes this
is the way some stories end.

                                                               
(prev. pub. in Medusa’s Kitchen, 11/12/19)
                  
__________________

Today’s LittleNip:

DESIRE
—Joyce Odam

take this incident of love—this love
that is so perfect—that you believe in,

take this round thought—let it blur,
gaze into the first desolation,

O, take this love—this hesitation—
this round thought, this blurry passion,

—alas! you take this blinding shape—
repeating to a blur—becoming fire.

__________________

Joyce and Robin Odam have brought us shudders of shadows of desolation today—our Seed of the Week—and we thank them for their fine, atmospheric poems and pix! These are indeed the envy of shadows…

Our new Seed of the Week is for Labor Day, “Work”. 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.

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

__________________

—Medusa

 

 

 

",,,slow sleep at the waft of surrender..."

—Public Domain Image Courtesy of Medusa

A reminder that
Twin Lotus Thai Fourth Tuesdays
features Brad Buchanan and students
tonight, 6pm—
reservations strongly advised!
For info about this and other
future 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!