Bullshit, Said Poetry

—Photo by Richard Hansen, Sacramento

I SAID TO POETRY

—Alice Walker

I said to Poetry: "I'm finished

with you."

Having to almost die

before some weird light

comes creeping through

is no fun.

"No thank you, Creation,

no muse need apply.

I'm out for good times—

at the very least,

some painless convention."

Poetry laid back

and played dead

until this morning.

I wasn't sad or anything,

only restless.

Poetry said: "You remember

the desert, and how glad you were

that you have an eye

to see it with? You remember

that, if ever so slightly?"

I said: "I didn't hear that.

Besides, it's five o'clock in the a.m.

I'm not getting up

in the dark

to talk to you."

Poetry said: "But think about the time

you saw the moon

over that small canyon

that you liked much better

than the grand one—and how surprised you were

that the moonlight was green

and you still had

one good eye

to see it with.

Think of that!"

"I'll join the church!" I said,

huffily, turning my face to the wall.

"I'll learn how to pray again!"

"Let me ask you," said Poetry.

"When you pray, what do you think

you'll see?"
 

Poetry had me.

"There's no paper

in this room," I said.

"And that new pen I bought

makes a funny noise."

"Bullshit," said Poetry.

"Bullshit," said I.

____________________

—Medusa

 

Eccentric Music

Excelsior

UNBORN MOUNTAINS

Fish swim through them.
They collect things no one has seen
For millions of years.

They know names of things we have
Never heard of and can say who dwells
There.  They speak to fish and are understood.

Their dreams are of high cliffs.  They imagine
No one will ever reach their summits.
They breed their own animals.

They used to have a religion but it is
On the bottom of the ocean now.  Only
The flashing of light on wave tops is remembered.

They have no concept of rooms and often
Believe they are clouds.  They change shape almost
As often.  They desire the sky and feel they can
Not live without it.  They are right about everything.

Occasionally they understand the nature
Of lakes.  They talk of trees and glaciers
As children talk of toys and dreams.

They think nothing can stop them
And have no concept of the dead.
There is never enough room.
Time gives them incredible gems
Which they hide and eventually forget.

They invent weather and always talk
About it among themselves.
They learn by folding the earth.
They learn by pushing against one another.
They are able to recall immense herds of bison,
The passenger pigeon, the great reptiles.

_____________________

FIRE OPAL

Her eyes were fire opals.
The night took her for a lover
But she did not stay with him
For long.

Her kisses were fire opals.
The shades of the jungle
Clustered about her and
She glittered
Against the smallest of any light.

Her skin was fire opal.
Fire itself tried to hold her
But her appetite was great.
She ate entire mountains in a single
Day.  She was unquenchable.

Her breath too was fire opal.
The Arctic and the Antarctic
Fought over her, throwing huge,
Perfect blue icebergs into the sea.
They tried to dress her, but she alone
Was fire opal and only mirrors
Could hold her and only water
Knew her name, and she spoke it
Alone to me.

____________________

“As Greenfoot slow she moves
Among the Seasons.”  ............Robin Williamson

Water mixes with water and it is my dreaming
That goes away.  I am standing on a street
Corner in a small city I have visited before
But am unable to recall its name or where
It is located.  There is a moon out but it is
Daytime.  It has a slightly violet color.

I realize that I will soon be dead and that
Lives are very quickly forgotten, names
No longer recognized and in vain I struggle
To recall why I thought I could meet you here.

My spirit spreads thin and I keep thinking
That I might recognize some symbol or shadow
That will give me a clue to this woven labyrinth.
I conclude I must have been following you.

Why else would I have this dagger in my hand?
I first thought it was a jewel or some other deception
But it is a serious dagger that has become part
Of my hand without my realizing this has happened.

I try to claim this is only a circumstance, that I
Am unable to name anything and merely guess
At this landscape, its dense bamboo groves,
The trickling of water, the unexplained color
That belongs to either heaven or hell.  This
Does not matter any longer.

I catch a glimpse of you slipping around a tree
And raise my dagger, beginning a pursuit.
I hope that I am not here for long and that
There will be a way out of this that will preclude
Suffering.  I see your coat and it is orange and black
Stripes.  It is then I recognize this garden, abandon
All hope of return and recall perfectly that you
Are the tiger and I am some eccentric music
Brought here to dance with you in this way.

Grafitti 2

THE CLOTHING OF THE SOULS

It was Ramon who told me the lights had come
Out of the forest.  I did not believe him.  The lights
Never came out of the forest.  Most people didn’t
Even know they were there in the first place.

Are you sure?  I asked him but I knew he was
Telling the truth.  He never said anything
That wasn’t true. 

We had seen the lights in the forest when
We were teenagers.  Far past Mullandy’s
Old farm, out where there weren’t trails
Any longer, where we knew the larger
Animals lived, we had first seen them.

There was a crystal quality about them.
They refracted light and often seemed
To hover about four feet off the ground.
They were usually seen in dense groups.
They moved quickly and seemed to sense
When someone was looking at them.

It was impossible to follow them.
They moved in the night air as through
A labyrinth, twisting, forming colored
Chains of light that flitted and dodged
Before one.  It was like we were not
Supposed to see them ever.

Twice we had seen them make swirling
Circles and we knew we had heard a music
Coming from them but not truly from them but from our
Heads, which filled with this music when they swirled.

We had watched them for years but never learned
Much about them.  We knew they could change
Colors at will and that they had some kind of communication
About them.  They never came closer than the meadows
And even then it was rare for them to do so.

Now they were in the streets of our town
Like exclamations about the shapes night
Could take.  They would surround certain
People and swirl around them slowly at first,
Then with a ferocity that should have frightened
The people but apparently they could not see
These lights.  They were our domain only.

This continued for about three weeks,
Well toward the full moon. We noticed
The larger animals had come closer   
To the town as well.  Then just as suddenly
As it had started, it stopped.

We have been gifted by some great power.,
Ramon said.  Now when we look at others
We can see the clothing of their souls.
We can see how their souls are moving
In this universe.  All that coming and going
Is only the language of the stars.  Wear
Your soul as if it were a bracelet made of diadems.
Give it to all you meet on this crazy planet.
This light will appear to us as what we call
The stars.  We will recognize others who
Can see this way.  They will name the stars.
We will be able to pronounce these names for them.

Above the Fray

(tapestry detail)

OUT OF LUCK

We have no right to be here.
“A silver planet in another sky.”
The long tips of our wings almost
Touching the ground, even as we sit
High in the trees overlooking our village.

The collection of sounds here has been
Hand-selected by other poets
Who have run out of luck.
They have became gray and finger
Their weapons as if trying to decide
Something that, at one time, was quite
Important.  They have done nothing
But to erect a different kind of meaning
Here at the gates of this place.

They change constantly, like translations
From foreign languages, myths
Of nothingness, jagged remnants
Absolved of all boundaries, clawing
Their way toward the tree we occupy,
Believing we can bring them either
Oblivion or immortality.
They become as waves crashing
Against the shore. 

___________________

TRYING TO GET THROUGH THE MIRROR

Touching happiness briefly
As its train moves through what
May be a moment or an eternity.
We are so easily confused.

Do not look too closely at these words.
Everything is here.  Nothing is lost.
The faces will leave us, sliding into mirrors
Right in front of our eyes.  A glow
We will beg to be part of, for we
Believe we are leaving this place,
When it is only the reflection
Abandoning all its corridors,
Slipping into the perfect sunset.

I beg you call these words a destiny,
Nothing less, that all that one could
Possibly become is one moment
Of our discovered lives.

Yet when we sit at the table
At the end of the day,
Time offers us the choicest morsel
Most seriously. 
This is forgetfulness.

___________________

Today's LittleNip:

FOR 5/17/13

Forgive me the ephemeral, forgive me
The unchangeable path, the complete lack
Of language spreading through this afternoon.

__________________

—Medusa, with thanks to D.R. Wagner for today's poems and pix!

Grafitti

Car Of My Sleepless Nights

—Photo by Richard Hansen, Sacramento

THE MAIL

—Raymond Carver

On my desk, a picture postcard from my son

in southern France. The Midi,

he calls it. Blue skies. Beautiful houses

loaded with begonias. Nevertheless 

he's going under, needs money fast.

Next to his card, a letter 

from my daughter telling me her old man,

the speed-freak, is tearing down

a motorcycle in the living room.

They're existing on oatmeal,

she and her children. For God's sake,

she could use some help.

And there's the letter from my mother

who is sick and losing her mind.

She tells me she won't be here

much longer. Won't I help her make

this one last move? Can't I pay 

for her to have a home of her own?

I go outside. Thinking to walk

to the graveyard for some comfort.

But the sky is in turmoil.

The clouds, huge and swollen with darkness,

about to spew open.

It's then the postman turns into

the drive. His face

is a reptile's, glistening and working. 

His hand goes back—as if to strike!

It's the mail.

________________________

THE AUTOPSY ROOM

—Raymond Carver

Then I was young and had the strength of ten.

For anything, I thought. Though part of my job

at night was to clean the autopsy room

once the coroner's work was done. But now

and then they knocked off early, or too late.

For, so help me, they left things out

on their specially built table. A little baby,

still as a stone and snow cold. Another time,

a huge black man with white hair whose chest

had been laid open. All his vital organs

lay in a pan beside his head. The hose

was running, the overhead lights blazed.

And one time there was a leg, a woman's leg,

on the table. A pale and shapely leg.

I knew it for what it was. I'd seen them before.

Still, it took my breath away.

When I went home at night my wife would say,

"Sugar, it's going to be all right. We'll trade

this life in for another." But it wasn't

that easy. She'd take my hand between her hands

and hold it tight, while I leaned back on the sofa

and closed my eyes. Thinking of . . . something.

I don't know what. But I'd let her bring

my hand to her breast. At which point

I'd open my eyes and stare at the ceiling, or else

the floor. Then my fingers strayed to her leg.

Which was warm and shapely, ready to tremble

and raise slightly, at the slightest touch.

But my mind was unclear and shaky. Nothing

was happening. Everything was happening. Life

was a stone, grinding and sharpening.

______________________

WHERE THEY'D LIVED
—Raymond Carver

Everywhere he went that day we walked

in his own past. Kicked through piles

of memories. Looked through windows

that no longer belonged to him.

Work and poverty and short change.

In those days they'd lived by their wills,

determined to be invincible.

Nothing could stop them. Not

for the longest while.

                                    In the motel rooms

that night, in the early morning hours,

he opened a curtain. Saw clouds

banked against the moon. He leaned

closer to the glass. Cold air passed

through and put its hand over his heart.

I loved you, he thought.

Loved you well.

Before loving you no longer.

_____________________

THE CAR

—Raymond Carver

The car with a cracked windshield.

The car that threw a rod.

The car without brakes.

The car with a faulty U-joint.

The car with a hole in its radiator.

The car I picked peaches for.

The car with a cracked block.

The car with no reverse gear.

The car I traded for a bicycle.

The car with steering problems.

The car with generator trouble.

The car with no back seat.

The car with the torn front seat.

The car that burned oil.

The car with rotten hoses.

The car that left the restaurant without paying.

The car with bald tires.

The car with no heater or defroster.

The car with its front end out of alignment.

The car the child threw up in.

The car I threw up in.

The car with the broken water pump.
The car whose timing gear was shot.

The car with a blown head-gasket.

The car I left on the side of the road.

The car that leaked carbon monoxide.

The car with a sticky carburetor.

The car that hit the dog and kept going.

The car with a hole in its muffler.

The car with no muffler.

The car my daughter wrecked.

The car with the twice-rebuilt engine.

The car with corroded battery cables.

The car bought with a bad check.

Car of my sleepless nights.

The car with a stuck thermostat.

The car whose engine caught fire.

The car with no headlights.

The car with a broken fan belt.

The car with wipers that wouldn't work.

The car I gave away.
The car with transmission trouble.

The car I washed my hands of.

The car I struck with a hammer.

The car with payments that couldn't be met.

The repossessed car.

The car whose clutch-pin broke.

The car waiting on the back lot.

Car of my dreams.

My car.

______________________

Today's LittleNip:

MEMORY [2]

—Raymond Carver

She lays her hand on his shoulder

at the checkout stand. But he won't 

go with her, and shakes his head.

She insists! He pays. She walks out

with him to his big car, takes one look,

laughs at it. Touches his cheek.

Leaves him with his groceries

in the parking lot. Feeling foolish.

Feeling diminished. Still paying.

_____________________

—Medusa

 —Photo by Richard Hansen

 

Machines, Infernal and Otherwise

—Photo by Taylor Graham

A LATE SPRING WALK
—Taylor Graham, Placerville

Through the trees I heard—what? machetes
hacking a way through jungle or a mercenary
army with sabers and bayonets?
and beneath the metallic clatter and clanking,
a deep grumble—as if dragons leapfrogged
through the meadow where, for years,
I've walked my dogs. Was I hallucinating?
Here, the rutted path—once a logging spur—

barricaded by a sugar-pine that fell long ago.
And here, the halfway point of my hike,
deserted forest backstretch; the only sound
should be woodpecker drumming on bark.
My dogs ran ahead, then back, to make sure
I was following. No sense of risk-all, just
a romp in the woods. And, when we reached
the edge, a view of bulldozers ripping out
brambles of berries about to ripen; scoring
new roads across meadow. This was no infernal
dream; just machines in the hire of progress.

____________________

THE TOW-BEHIND MOWER
—Taylor Graham

It took us an hour to release it
from its shipping crate. Quick assembly.
Diagrams in the owner's manual bore
no resemblance to the disconnected metal parts
lying dead before us. 800-tech support
spoke an alternate language. Somewhere
was a safety switch-off not mentioned
in the manual. Meanwhile our grass grew brittle-
dry in unseasonable spring swelter,
seedheads waving their golden locks, enticing
flame. At last we dialed a local
number. A roving fix-it-man rode up
on a big white 4-wheel charger. His laugh
was brash as summer, to set the earth spinning
on its axle again. He flipped some switches,
turned some screws; never glanced
at the owner's manual. On the first crank
the engine roared to life. He stepped back,
a flourish of his hand: Your turn.
I pulled. Nothing. He laughed like sun-up
with a breeze. I tugged again,
harder. Success! Our golden pasture
glowed for haying.

_____________________

RITES OF SPRING
—Taylor Graham

What interloper-grass grows here?
Just see the pathways we've mowed clear.
If tufted green turns firegold
as summer flame, it costs us dear.

We fear its spells, and shear its locks.
We pave it, lay down cinder-blocks
and listen for it thumping underneath.
We check our calendars and clocks

for buried roots and fists and teeth.
A blade of grass waits in its sheath
to throw its seed on wind; take wing
and scatter over field and heath.

Small birds will nest on any thing—

a cup of witchgrass, fur, and string
beneath our eaves. Such rites of spring.
Just listen to the wildness sing.

____________________

DESERTED
—Taylor Graham

They had perfect keys in their pockets.
Now their jackets—sky-blue, red, midnight
gray—hang on the schoolyard fence.

Lost and Found. They left the playground
without fear of weather. Mothers will never
understand the dreaming and forgetting,

leaving jackets that cost a pretty
penny. Sins of omission. They left home,
heads full of moons shiny as coins.

Moons that might fix everything, even
words. Now the jackets hang like forgotten
visions; relics of children who once

chased wind-shadows, ricocheted among
hidden things, dug at earth-magic;
who could see the wind. The children, gone

now, who years ago left these jackets
behind. Perhaps they're grown, with many
keys in their large pockets.

Do any of those keys unlock the wind?

—Photo by Taylor Graham

BITTERSWEET MACHINES
—B.Z. Niditch, Brookline, MA

How come
at this computer age
we poets on the run
still have to breathe
in words from memory
as ritualized black ink
collects and audits
our thoughts
from our all-night stands,
which opens up
to the world
all enigmas in our life
riddled among machines,
these sickly-sweet
smart transplants
of high-tech knowledge
which educates
while it subjugates,
helps yet hurts us
at the same time
we become fixated
in our red-eye universe
keeping us awake
in a cold prism and prison
of our own images
with hand prints
of recorded hard drives
vibrating, accumulating
like an inventory
of crumbling blankness
sometimes resembling
false gods or idols
taking us away
from writing itself
which is our vocation.

__________________

PROOFREADING
—B.Z. Niditch

It's easy to imagine
those riddled moments
immersed in words
with a red eye
collapsed ear drum
or clasped fingers
in my solitude task
at the bottom of night
drawing a blank
on snowy spaces
through pools
of white-out,
trying to retouch
my original intention
tumbling down
from piles of papers
occasionally falling
on my overcast flesh
with a sore nape of neck
and butchered knees
rounding a computer
orbit of words
crossing my notes
with the spacey sound
of antonyms and verbs
waiting to be scanned
and read into existence
on a gag of lip
hungering for
punctured apostrophes
from burning language
in my gnarled mouth
of lemon lozenges
catching eyelashes
from wrangled notes
with a twinned patch
of tiny adjectives,
imprinted commas
snagged in arrangement
on a doubtful page
of vagabond labor.

____________________

BEST FRIEND
(a poem to honor Kathy Kieth)
—B.Z. Niditch

You live with poetry
your best friend
who elevates
you to heights
of far-end language,
full of asides
swears justice
and numinous,
edifies and defies
sizes up
puts down
inspects words
suspects everything,
motions to us
calls on the divine
issues manifestos,

exchanges proverbs,
overthrows regimens
and regimes,
screams out
against death
never silent
stands for life
justice and peace
inscribed
by words, paroles,
on once blank pages
of proofreading
with long refrains
of translation
on short notice.

__________________

Today's LittleNip:

The Muse has no deference, only its reference, preference and reverence to her own secrets.

—B.Z. Niditch

_________________

—Medusa, who reminds you that there are FOUR readings in our area today and tonight, including the premiere of a new WTF from Rattlesnake Press at Luna's Cafe this evening! Scroll down to the blue board at the right of this for all the details.

—Photo by Taylor Graham

To Passion On The Page

—Photo by Katy Brown, Davis

LOVING YOU ON THE CHEAP

—William S. Gainer, Grass Valley

Nila—

I stopped by
the Burnal Equinox
(the Burning Man thing)
to say hi,
but they wanted 25
dollars—
five extra
because I looked
normal. 

I liked that—
it's been a while
since I've had to pay
extra
for looking normal.

Anyway kid
I kept the 25,
went around the corner
had a cold drink
spent my
leftover
normal
money
on five dollars
worth of quarters

topped off a few
parking meters
before leaving town.

I’d have left a note
but didn’t know
which one
was yours.

____________________

AND

—Trina Drotar, Sacramento
 
in the middle
sits that dog you used to call Taffy—or was it
a cat you used to own?

I no longer recall

whether a bird flew past my window one night
or ten nights. Perhaps it was ten, each night
a place where dreams formed, where I begged
to be a child again, running through the poppies
and the lupine, chasing butterflies and catching
snakes and lizards in the grasses on the mountain
behind our house.

That house never burned down

like the one up the next hill. Do you remember
how the people gathered and watched the smoke
rise and how the smoke choked the onlookers
and how that family never returned? 

I remember

how I used to play games with those girls, and
that I’d invite them to our home and we’d eat
fresh fruits, usually plums from our backyard.

George used to jump that fence, and he jumped
it once too many times. Hit by a car, he wore
that cast for several weeks. Remember how
he’d run down the stairs and greet you? All six
foot of him? He’s long gone now, but he spent
his best years in the Midwest on a farm. I cried
when he left, when you left. I bawled when you left,
and I didn’t know what to do when the runt kitten
from Punkin’s litter, the litter she bore in my closet,
died in my hands. We fed it milk, and now I know
that probably wasn’t the best choice. Not the best
choice to feed the runt milk.

—Photo by Katy Brown

PLEASE STAY A WHILE
—David Iribarne, Sacramento

Happiness is here
outside my window
let in in, let it stay for a while.

Let it bake and baste
let it simmer and marinate
for a while so when I taste it
I truly savor its juices.

Let it make a home
let it grow and bloom
overshadowing the dim lights
that creep in every so often.

Bring it close to me
let me breathe it in
take over my body
close my eyes
and open them everything
around me glows
all my chaotic cares slowly disappear.

I feel tingling through my soul
like when I taste a sweet strawberry
or when you eat chocolate cake for the first time
or when you meet your true love
and you don’t feel lost and insecure.

Happiness surround me
create a fence around me
that I cannot hurdle.
Stay here with me, don’t leave
I just want to smile and look at you for a while.

_____________________

IF, MONSIEUR PROUST

—Tom Goff, Carmichael

If, Monsieur Proust, you craft grand sentences
intently recording Swann’s long-raging fever,
and if these periods of the poor fellow’s illness
outswell what inflammation I can see
traces to the caprice of Odette de Crécy,
how do such thought-rapids slow to stillness,
not once diminishing the lost believer
in love, both dismantling and erecting fences
between the event and all minds which endure that event,
so that, as a jealous obsessive learns to eavesdrop,
to accuse the more furiously by keeping silent,
I, voyeur, mishear at the doorstep that’s his griefstop,
and why, a pickpocket eyeing my target sidelong,
do I slink off as if discovered, stridewrong?

______________________

SONG'S A SMALL MATTER NOW
—Tom Goff

I’m listening to Arnold Bax’s Enchanted Summer:
the poetry of Shelley set for orchestra, choir
straining their topmost range until on fire,
the lyric words in gorgeous flow though obscure.
But English tonal purity wins, that rich texture,
desirable tenderness (like yours), each syllable
afloat over brassy massifs and the brawnful
body of beautifully sawn strings. I could vex your
mind, my soulmate, with such sweet endless tapestries,
these relentless weavings of obsession: for you,
you are my very own enchanted summer.
And lacking the touch of your warm strong fingers, the heat of you,
all the songs I’ve sung to this point are small matter, scattered:
no music can truly possess me, or leave me its grace or peace.

____________________

Our thanks to today's contributors! What do they all have in common, besides being fine artists and dandy people? All of them will be in the new issue of Rattlesnake Press's WTF, which will be unveiled tomorrow night (Thursday) at Poetry Unplugged at Luna's Cafe. 8pm: Be there!

____________________

Today's LittleNip:

OFF THE PAGE

—Allegra Silberstein, Davis

those high sea-worn cliffs 
eaten by thundering waves
the dark ocean
the rush curling in
the pulling back
the intoxication
the mirage
the wild bird
…oh…
let us drink to collaboration
to passion
on the page
off the page
to forever
the possibility

___________________

—Medusa

—Photo by Katy Brown

[Today's photos were taken at 

the gardens of

Davis's solar community]

Thoughts Like Webs

SLEEPLESS

do the dark now
do the dark
the way you do it

squeeze in the music
from the next apartment
slip the light under the door
fade the carpeted footsteps
that go by in the hallway
free the creakings in the wall

outside
the puddles shine with rain
the streetlamp studies them
car-doors slam closed
and voices say goodbye
the moving hours are the same

do the dark now
make it right
the moon is bright
do the dark now
say goodnight


(first pub. in Wings, 1995)

__________________

TALKING

She hides under her low voice
for his deafness,
says it’s her throat
that keeps her words inaudible . . .
so full of illness.

She talks all the time,
he asking what she says
which she repeats for him
just as low.

                       
(first pub in Galley Sail Review, 1988)

___________________

OF MY EFFORT

It was a dream
the way I moved against myself
multi-imaged
and tired of my effort.
       .
She turned and watched
where I struggled
from so far away.
Her hair hung in ropes.
       .
I was in the body of the child.
My hands pressed my air.
My voices jarred my silence and 
     sound.
There was no safe parent around.
       .
She had thoughts
like webs
and I walked through them
into her secrets.

HOME ALONG THE LEAVES

Home along the leaves that have fallen from her gold tree. She smiles goodbye and hello with the same face. She waits in the same old window for your wave. She remembers everything about you. You are returning from her one more time. She will embrace you and weep. Her eloquent tree will watch through the window and twirl its leaves in celebration; your connection to the tree’s birds will be the beginning of conversation. The sunlight will cut its sharp path along the definitive branches. All will be told in the voices of women who know what to say to each other. Her gold tree will sing in the air with its brightness and shed more leaves. “These are its tears,” you will offer, and she will know what you mean and once more kiss you goodbye.

_______________________

MOTHER CALLS ME WITH HER DYING

Mother says she is dreaming that she is dying and just wanted to warn me, prepare me for the phone call that would come.

I am calm, remove myself from responding. I don’t want to hear this. Mother’s voice is turned down low. I can barely hear her.

She says she has to be careful, that they listen at the Nurse’s Station, but she is dying in her sleep and she wanted me to know—wanted to hear my voice—hundreds of miles between us, and time itself three hours away.

Now, I don’t want you to grieve, she tells me in her old no-nonsense voice; and though I try to open my mouth to answer, she keeps on talking.

I cannot interrupt her, though she dwindles off again. Wake up! I want to say—but don’t know what that would mean—if she is really dying—in her sleep—in her mind—in my imagination.

_______________________

FROM A LOST SUMMER DAY
Quick Impressions (After O’Hara).

I sink back into tall green grasses.
A soft breeze bends the grasses over me.

Sky-clouds form,
and reform. Voices call my name—

my name that I do not want to hear.
I will not remember my name.

I am in my dreaming.
Awake. Floating in the sea of grasses,

I, and the motioning green shadows,
borne upon the width of forever.

I will never come out.
I am green grass and green shadow.

Even the sky makes room for me—
all energy—one wide presence

without form—
everything alive in my thinking.

A child wants to be alone with child-self. 
No voice. No calling.

______________________

Today's LittleNip:

The words conspire

in a tender voice—
what will they mean

with their secret meaning,
foreign to the din of language?

They soothe; they are there
for the forgiving—

they have silence,
which is desirable.

Silence is their secret.

______________________

—Medusa, with thanks to Joyce Odam for today's poems and pix! Time for a new Seed of the Week: Those Infernal Machines. Send your musings about the same to kathykieth@hotmail.com

Urban Tumbleweeds and the Seven Tribes

Juggler, Whole Earth Festival, UC Davis

—Photo by Michelle Kunert

URBAN TUMBLEWEEDS

—Michelle Kunert, Sacramento

Travel along with the "urban tumbling tumbleweed"

  Handed out as convenience bags
  often seen blown around by the wind outside
  in streets and parking lots 

  or tangled as litter in bushes and trees
  These plastic "tumbleweeds" probably don't break down in the sun
  (just like the petrochemicals that make them)
  before they sail to the ocean
  to likely be mistaken for jellyfish and swallowed up by creatures
  Some with labels of thrift stores
  which perhaps shouldn't be making them, either

____________________

BOTTLEBRUSH

—Michelle Kunert
 
a sudden flash May rainstorm:
spent, the blooming crimson bottlebrush plant
spilling red needles all over the pavement outside
like those of a dead Christmas pine tree upon a white carpet

once buzzing with bees for its pollen
now what remains on its defrocked frame

is just the humming of flies  

___________________

Why does that girl run around all by herself around the schoolyard?
  She must play with the other children at recess they say
  Little do they know she daydreams of being elsewhere
  Perhaps she is in her land of imaginary friends where she is a princess
  rather than a "rebellious child" in need of chastisement and punishment

(For Becky Foust, who was looking for poems for those with Asperger's syndrome)

—Michelle Kunert

 Artwork from Short Center North,

Arden-Dimick Library

—Photo by Michelle Kunert

THE SEVEN TRIBES
—Olga Blu Browne, Sacramento

Hiding beyond a shadow's
edge,

returning to the cycle of
time

waiting for the Vikings of
sunrise

and the host of phantom
listeners:

the red thread of the
ancients,

the seven tribes of the
Black Tortoise.

_________________

SSHH

—Olga Blu Browne

Breath is the sacrifice,
sshh—listen to the silence,
read my words, feel what
I wrote.

Sshh—is breath the sacrifice
or merely the memory of a
fatigued mind?

__________________

WITHOUT WARMTH
—Olga Blu Browne

A web of barren branches
below a winter moon,

silent against a frozen earth
where a quilt of leaves

blankets the ground without
warmth.


(first pub. in Brevities)

_________________

Today's LittleNip: 

FLESH  

—Olga Blu Browne

Like an autobiography of
your emotions,

poetry is where the flesh
encounters the soul,

with the power and grace
of your words.

________________

—Medusa

 Yeti from Holland sings at the

Whole Earth Festival, UC Davis

—Photo by Michelle Kunert