The Year's Midnight

Sunset in Colorado

—Photo by Roger Langton, Louisville, CO

A NOCTURNAL UPON ST. LUCY'S DAY, BEING 

THE SHORTEST DAY
—John Donne

TIS the year's midnight, and it is the day's,


Lucy's, who scarce seven hours herself unmasks;
    

    The sun is spent, and now his flasks
   

    Send forth light squibs, no constant rays;
            

             The world's whole sap is sunk;


The general balm th' hydroptic earth hath drunk,


Whither, as to the bed's-feet, life is shrunk,


Dead and interr'd; yet all these seem to laugh,


Compared with me, who am their epitaph.

Study me then, you who shall lovers be


At the next world, that is, at the next spring;
   

    For I am every dead thing,
    

    In whom Love wrought new alchemy.
           

             For his art did express


A quintessence even from nothingness,


From dull privations, and lean emptiness;


He ruin'd me, and I am re-begot


Of absence, darkness, death—things which are not.

All others, from all things, draw all that's good,


Life, soul, form, spirit, whence they being have;
    

     I, by Love's limbec, am the grave
    

     Of all, that's nothing. Oft a flood
            

             Have we two wept, and so


Drown'd the whole world, us two; oft did we grow,


To be two chaoses, when we did show


Care to aught else; and often absences


Withdrew our souls, and made us carcasses.

But I am by her death—which word wrongs her—


Of the first nothing the elixir grown;
    

    Were I a man, that I were one
    

     I needs must know; I should prefer,
            

             If I were any beast,


Some ends, some means ; yea plants, yea stones detest,


And love; all, all some properties invest.


If I an ordinary nothing were,


As shadow, a light, and body must be here.

But I am none; nor will my sun renew.


You lovers, for whose sake the lesser sun
    

      At this time to the Goat is run
    

      To fetch new lust, and give it you,
           

             Enjoy your summer all,


Since she enjoys her long night's festival.


Let me prepare towards her, and let me call


This hour her vigil, and her eve, since this


Both the year's and the day's deep midnight is.

 Sunset in California

—Photo by Katy Brown, Davis

PRIDE
—B.Z. Niditch, Brookline, MA

With a banker's valise
of debits and credits
he lets nothing slide

With his city bureaucratic
luggage made of leather
he looks down at you

With four degrees in hand
at his latest graduation
his chest swells

With his station master's
authority
you hold your ticket up

With a mop in hand
he overpowers his brother
out of work.

___________________

OUR PRESENTIMENTS
—B.Z. Niditch

Approaching sundown
your friend paints
her fingernails green
after her last affair
with a stud
and Hollywood understudy,
the buzz downtown
expects her suffocating
break-ups to go on
like all the others,
to last a headache full
of a week's drama
queen memories
on walls of rumors
to capture her lovers
misadventures,
reeling in words
like diphthongs
of departures.

___________________

CRYSTAL LAKE
—B.Z. Niditch

A runaway teenager
with a pale gaze
from the lake's sunrise
hides blank pages
of his little black book
of addresses
in his jeans
back pocket
checking out
an infinite recital
of phone numbers
in a visage of words
now reflecting on
a deliberation of trees
as thunder rolls by
on newborn shadows
transfigured by
his father's
and mother's nature.

_____________________

EDEN AND OUT
       for Newtown
—Tom Goff, Carmichael

I say Eden was abandoned the day
gunpowder sparked in Heaven and spread,
serpent-spread, here below. The day
our Parents left: what we never hear of
is the unholy racket, sanctimonious noise:
stacked grails, gold gold and white gold,
shot off the garden fence rails, Michael
at practice. We only thought, from
Milton on down, the sword of fire capped
with silencer. With wandering steps and slow
on through Eden and out, till the spray
of celestial hell, or the sight of the muzzle flash,
stanched their weeping: then they dove
& sped crawling through thorns for safety,
mimicking one living thing they’d fatally met
but never given a name.

____________________

Our poets and photographers come from all over heck-and-gone today (including John Donne, who comes to us from the 17th century!); thanks to them for gathering in the Kitchen to warm up on this chilly Solstice! For more Winter Solstice poetry, see www.wintersolsticemusic.com/solstice-traditions/winter-solstice-poetry-celtic-mid-winter-poetry.htm

Rachel Hansen of The Book Collector writes: HUGE SALE at The Book Collector this weekend! This Friday, Saturday and Sunday (December 21st to 23rd) almost all our books will be 50% OFF! Only the second time in almost 18 years that we've offered such a deep discount. This is NOT a going out of business sale, just a chance to save on great reads. It will be raining but the bookstore will be warm and dry and the mall will be crowded and depressing. Where would you rather be? The Book Collector [Home of the Snake] is located at 1008 24th Street, on 24th Street between J and K Streets in Midtown Sacramento. I will be there most of the weekend if you want to stop by for a hug—I could use a few. Please tell your friends!

____________________

Today's LittleNip:

NIGHT OUT OF DAY
—Michael Cluff, Corona

Christmas Day is almost here
but first let us hope
the 21st does not go
strange and queer
and the sun swallows up the planet
with a fireball or hot plasma flow
or even a stray asteroid called Janet
but being alone I could not cope
with even the lightest axis trope.

___________________

—Medusa who, in her controlled folly, assumes the world will not end today...

Night Speeding In

—Photo by D.R. Wagner, Elk Grove

New Days Ahead

—Photo by Richard Hansen, Sacramento

COWBOY CHOIR

—Patricia Wellingham-Jones, Tehama

Stetson at his feet, replaced


by jaunty crimson Santa cap,


buzzard feather black in the band,


the old cowboy clangs his bell


in front of the bank.


Arm pumping up and down


he beams through gaps in his teeth,


points at the red kettle.


He wishes customers a happy holiday.


Over the brass tones of the bell


his rich baritone voice rises,


sings the first lines


of "Joy to the World."


Exiting the bank a rancher


trim in new jeans and leather vest


supplies the words in bass


when the Salvation Army man


sputters la la la.


Spattered with sawdust and manure


a ranch hand squeals his pickup


to a stop, jumps out, adds


his wavering tenor to the mix.


Inside three tellers roll eyes


and smile, slide their sopranos


with Christmas dollars


across the counter.



(first pub. in InDaily News, Adelaide, Australia 2012)

_______________________

CHRISTMAS WALK

—Patricia Wellinham-Jones      

Three thin young men amble
along the road in front of the house,
black t-shirts expose tattoos,
each arm blue with cold.
They eye the two women leaving the door
for a holiday walk, bundled
in coats and scarves, hats and gloves.

The young men watch, lips turn up at corners
under eyes chilly, assessing.
The women return their stares,
skin twitching. One says hello,
the men say hello back. One of the three says,
“Can you give me a dollar?”
A white-haired woman says no,
she left her money at home. The other
shudders at information too late realized.

They walk a few steps ahead of the men
on the far side of the road, go straight,
turn and look back at the corner.
The men crouch there, killing time,
waiting to see the women round the bend.
Heeding the urges in their guts
the women retrace their steps.

They watch from windows safe behind locks
for the men to go.
Unwilling to leave the house empty,
ruing the walk they didn’t take,
they feel boxed in by their fears,
by the look in men’s eyes.

______________________

FIRST CHRISTMAS AGAIN
—Patricia Wellingham-Jones

She bolted from the house,
from turkey gravy she was stirring,
from guests with wine glasses
tilted to their lips,
from her new step-daughter’s family.

In the slight protection of the eaves
she opened her mouth, released
into rain the wail that had built
through an endless round of hosting.
Bent from the waist, she roared out sobs
she’d swallowed all day.

Heedless of her hairdo
she stepped away from shelter
into storm, tipped her head back,
let rain wash down her cheeks
with tears.

Returning through a distant door
she splashed cold water on red, swollen eyes,
dragged a comb through flattened hair,
freshened makeup. Pinning a smile
on still-trembling lips, she rejoined the group

apologizing to nobody,
including her husband
of a few months,
for missing the one
no longer there.


(first pub. in Voices on the Land, Rattlesnake Press, 2004)

—Photo by Richard Hansen

PARIS 1848                               
—Taylor Graham, Placerville

Now she stirs
starter in the crock,
it bubbles
with a life
caught out of thin air—a spoor
that works in the dark,

ready to
combine with milled wheat;
punched down and
punched again,
but alive, set aside, and
left alone to rise

like a man's
wishes for his life—

all those men
on the streets
shouting vive la liberté
and droit au travail—

right to work,
rise above themselves.
A whole new
day ahead
for breaking tyrants, and for
the breaking of bread.

_______________________

MISS MERRY CHRISTMAS
—Ann Wehrman, Sacramento

    In the forest, when I was growing up, sun-warmed breeze blew through my needles and bent my branches.  White trillium, mountain violets, and purple beds of heather danced before rain; flowers nestled around me, tickling me with thick, green leaves.  Deer and squirrels played, mountain jays and ravens skimmed past me in the air, and slimy banana slugs crept by, along with ants and fat worms that plowed the earth under my branches.
    I drank summer rain, fresh water, and air.  The rich black earth nourished me.  I listened to whispered songs and learned the secrets of the mountain from the ancient sequoias towering over me.  When at night glowing stars danced and spun throughout the black heavens, I swayed with them and felt the wind in my branches, crooning her songs of deep joy. 
    Seasons passed, and I matured; grew plump and full, my branches a deep, luxurious green.  Then one cold winter day, a large, raucous, harshly reflective object entered my clearing, and two beings climbed out from inside it. 
    “Here’s a real beauty, Bob!”
    “Don’t look like nothin’ but another damn tree to me—another tree, another dollar, that’s what I always say,” replied the other.  Their power saw bit into my trunk, its tearing roar deafened my screams, and I fell to the frozen grass.
    In the back of their vehicle, I jostled, torn trunk dripping sap, my mind growing weaker as my sap dried.  Finally, we reached this place, with its strange lights, crowds of people, and so many trees, some with no breath at all left to tell their stories. 
    I gasped this last, my branches leaning on the young blue spruce on my left.  Originally inquisitive, she fell silent halfway through my tale.
    “Hey, plug in that sign!  Nobody’ll stop if they can’t see we’re open for business!”

______________________

Our thanks to today's poets, and to Richard Hansen for the photos. It's good to hear from Patricia Wellingham-Jones again, a long-time SnakePal (her Voices on the Land was the third-ever Rattlechap we published), who has brought us some Poems of the Season for our daily stew. Ann Wehrman checks in as well with a seasonal short, and Taylor Graham is fiddling with the Shadorma, a fun and easy form you should try (they say it's addictive, like Christmas fudge!). Don't forget to send us your Poem(s) of the Season, and photos too. And—hey—artwork! Put pen/brush/whatever to paper/parchment/canvas and have at it!

_____________________

Today's LittleNip:

WAKEUP CUP

—Taylor Graham

O! first left-
over cup of joe!
better than
nothing, while
the French roast brews. So much left-
over stuff to do

____________________

—Medusa

—Photo by Richard Hansen

Our Imprecise Dialect

Graciela Ramirez reads (with JoAnn Anglin)
at the final Crossroads Reading Series
on Saturday, Dec. 15.
—Photo by Michelle Kunert

STARS IN MY HAND

—Taylor Graham, Placerville

She gave me a flattened silver egg
in a box that said, hold it under water
and you'll make things fresh again.

The egg held in my hand like river-
rock, wise and smooth, reflecting
light; it skipped stars across water.

It's quite useless for removing stains,
freshening bad blood, or disinfecting
dreams. But the stars are beautiful.
 

_____________________

MESSENGER

—Taylor Graham

You came from a foreign land,
across great waters, berth of a language
I don't understand—a wordless
syntax of barks and chirps and chirrups,
cheer-ups in our imprecise

dialect usurped by TV talk of breakfast-
food and mass mayhem at a school.
No one understands you here;
they say you wear a mask from the realms
of deer, wolf, eagle. We have our

plays and spectacles to amuse us in our
horror. You sniff the emptiness
through the cloth. Your eyes break into
messages... How to find, not
how to lose. This is why I trust you.

_____________________

NEVER ENOUGH...

—William S. Gainer, Grass Valley

There's never 
enough—

time


touch


love 


weeping 


for the angels.



It seems


put together


this way—


never enough


pieces 


to make it all 


complete



never enough 


time 


to make any of it 


the way


it could have been.



There's just 


never enough...

 

Tim Kahl sings an Italian opera aria
at the Italian-style Christmas party at 
Sacramento Poetry Center on
Monday, December 17 
—Photo by Michelle Kunert

GANGS AND GUNS

—Roger Langton, Louisville, CO

The two gangs have been
enemies for years.
The neighborhood children
take the places of those
who die and there are plenty
of guns to go around.
Two gang members
initiate a drive-by shooting
seeking revenge for some
unknown act of little consequence.
The driver shouted,
"There's one of those bastards."
The bullets rage from the gun.
One strikes the side of a house,
another whistles toward
the shaded porch.
One missile strikes a dark
figure crouching in the bushes.
The shooters speed off
with sounds of screaming wheels.
Next day the headline proclaims
that a famous athlete has been arrested
for drinking and driving.
There is a small article
reporting that a drive-by shooting
killed a child and his grandfather.

____________________

TRIBAL EYE
—Roger Langton

The tribal eye peered
out and judged me hard.
I had rejected the
family and broken the
ancient law of reciprocity.
Later, jammed
by culture lag
my blood kept the past
and made guilt the
wheelbarrow of
calloused hands.
The eye kept staring.
I shot my
squirt gun at it
and emptied a bottle
of wash but the
stare melted my behavior
into conformity

(Red Cedar Press, 1992)

____________________

NOT YET, PICASSO
—Roger Langton

Picasso stands next
to the lake.
He bends and extends
with head stretched
to the sunset.
A club foot protrudes
from his armpit.
A yellow bird flies
through his mouth
while a bone slides
up and down
his orange back.
He grins at the water
with skeleton teeth
and splashes
with a foot-long toe nail.
In time
he will come together,
but the time is not yet.
 

(Red Cedar Press, 1992)

_____________________ 

Our thanks to today's poets, and to Michelle Kunert for photos of two recent readings. For more of Michelle's pix of last Monday night's Italian party at SPC, see Medusa's newest Facebook page. Sacramento mourns the loss of the Crossroad Reading Series hosted by Trina Drotar and Sandy Thomas; it will be missed. Crossroads does have a Facebook page also; there you can see wonderful photos of some of the readings and those who attended.

A further loss to our community is Brigit Truex, founder of Red Fox Underground, who has moved from Placerville to Kentucky! Brigit, I hope you're reading this, and that you'll send us a wee poem every now and then.

______________________

Today's LittleNip:

BEING NEAR CHRISTMAS

—Michelle Kunert, Sacramento

   I dreamed instead of being on a Easter egg hunt
   While I was pulling plastic eggs out of the dirt
   I came across a little fir tree decorated with foiled eggs
   which turned out to be made with my favorite dark chocolate
   I quickly stuffed the candy in my pockets and my purse
   children came by and just asked for some
   but I demanded this tree was all mine 

_____________________

—Medusa

The gracious and graceful Graciela

—Photo by Michelle Kunert

All Can Be Built From Nothing

A GLUT OF ANGELS

I enter the house of angels and
am at once given a halo to carry
with me as I browse and admire.
The power of love is everywhere
in elegance and simplicity
and I am in the influence. I am
reduced to surprise of humility;
I want to soar through my own heart
like a reunion; I want my eyes
to preserve everything they see
in my symbolic need of angels.
The aisles narrow. . .angels balance
on shelves. . .crystal-bodied angels
sparkle from glass enclosures. . .
a cloy of angels fastens to the
walls. . .they overlap. . .they are
too many. . .they become one. . .
I am overwhelmed. . .I buy nothing. . .
I go out the door, still holding on
to my wire and glitter halo.
 
                        
(first pub. in CFCP Winning Poems Booklet, 1997
and Hayden’s Poetry Review, 1997)

_____________________

THE GULLS BEFORE STORM

I saw the gulls today beg down
among the cars in the grocery parking lot,
perspected large against the blue-white light,
making blue-white cries in the winter dusk.

I remember such a time –
once – before rain, when sun-bright gulls
came down to the field across the way
and I so admired the look of them

that you kept them near with gifts of bread
and they grew in number as the good word
spread. For over an hour you stood out there
in the pending weather

flinging bread
into the bristling air
for the shrill and swarming thankless gulls,
just for my pleasure.

                                           
(first pub. in Chrysanthemum, 2001)

_____________________

ACCESSORY

You have been standing
a long, long time
with the stolen rose
in your hand,
waiting to complete
your act of giving.

And now that the bush
has stopped its trembling
and the garden’s beast
is healing the wound
of beauty
in his tragic mind,
I come to you
in my furtive plunder
of receiving.

MARBLES

he brings me marbles
from a lost garden
under the weeds
in the turned soil
marble after marble
that he brings
for my jar of water
old waiting marbles
that have lain
in the darkness
noting that children
have lost them
years ago
and now they come to eyes
for praise
for appreciation
he has carried them
in his pocket
till he has worn them clean
and then he has
given them to me
one by one
over the thrifty years
after he has turned
all the soil
under and under
finding the pretty ones
the broken ones
all those marbles
that have turned into such an
enviable collection


(first pub. in Negative Capability, 1990)

___________________

AS IF ALL TIME

somewhere
my death sits waiting
with gifts of apples
in his lap
smiling into the direction
from which I will come
and practicing
the word he will say

it is a brimming afternoon
everything lazy and green
and young
and he has eloquent eyes
for me to enter
when I see him waiting there
as if all time
were his to have
beneath that tree

____________________

Today's LittleNip:

GIVING FORM TO IT

We must take the barest to make a joy
of anything – the least, the merest,
the brief observance, there for a moment;
we must take the fragment and construct

the whole – all can be built from nothing;
someone has to give form to it,
bring into being what was not there before,
be careful with it, let it be wonderful,

offer it from your pride and humility
to the astonished or the indifferent,
give it a title and a signature – make it
your own, then give it away to everyone.

____________________

—Medusa, with thanks to Joyce Odam for today's poems and pix celebrating The Best Gifts. This week, send us poems about the season: Christmas, New Year's, the Solstice, Kwanzaa, Festiva—your pick. Send Poems of the Season for our Seed of the Week to kathykieth@hotmail.com

Inshallah

Mike Sukach

INGENUITY

—Mike Sukach, Colorado Springs, CO

A lever can move the world, a stick a stone. 

Birds fashion hooks to fish worms from a pot.

Ford put moonshiners on the road, moon- 

shiners stilled moonshine in their Fords.

E.E. Cummings made rain in poems rain. The moon 

we made just days after launch the year I was born.

Once, in a faraway land, many men or one man said, 

no one could fly a kite; but then their illiteracy soared.

My dog will lick and nudge and skate a tinfoil pan 

across the floor, then paw it to keep it from budging.

Rosetta’s stone now fits in a phone that sits as small 

as a little blue bird biting big hard words soft & small.

No wine glass, a coffee cup, no cup, the bottle; 

no power, a pen, no ink, a pencil, then blood.

My wife places apples slices on the stone 

outcropping that defends this quiet patio

where I read and write and smoke too much. 

“So the bears and wolves and crows can eat.”

Inshallah, I am still sitting there learning old words 

from a book the beasts can already read in the dark.

_______________________

tear

—Mike Sukach

most begin somewhere 

beyond the glacial 

color of the iris 

in the deep infinity 

light sails through

the crystal lens 

a firth of terns 

storm-petrels 

inverted falls 

the sea overhead

those I like

wash the world 

quietly out of focus 

so I can return

______________________

SUBSCRIPTIONS

—Mike Sukach

I have a ton like Star Trek tribbles

they arrived early in the century 

the postman kicked them

 under my door 

as if he were sweeping 

away a hallway of pesky cats 

who tried to snuggle somewhere 

between the distal phalanx of the hallux 

and the stern metatarsal of the foot in his boot

the first poems inside were thin 

not sick thin, bulimic thin
but curvy          sexy thin

bone thin 

stamen 

thread 

razor 

cobweb 

nano                     thin

others arrived in varying weights 

and velocities 

one year they were all run-away pranks 

knocking at my door 

knock knock                          

                                                   pizza

but there was only the volume 

leaning against the threshold 

too drunk to make it home 

or care where that was
those I let in 

sheltered 

eventually 

mislaid
in couch cushions       under the stove 

and are still muttering about loss and love

decades of them displaced 

dishes 

TV trays 

Scrabble boards
others 

replaced stools

became pillows 

flyswatters 

coasters 

some sufficed nicely when a window broke 

or a new mouse hole happened

to appear

years passed and the fire marshal condemned 

my apartment 

a risk to the entire tenement 

bylined articles
in desultory newspapers    all over the world 

reinvented my entropic wilderness 

Guinness World Records called
                 but never “stopped by” 

so I evicted myself
in pushcart after 

     pushcart
after pushcart

seeing me is easy          now 

as I am never without them 

a train 

traffic
jam 

column 

bloodline 

holding hands around a fountain

                                                ten cents some (now) ask
thumbing too seriously 

petting too suspiciously 

sniffing too antiquely 

my carts
boxcars 

empires 

of subscription poetry

but none are too sure when I tell them the special 

ten to look                      but we take it in nickels

Mike again

DESCENDENTS

—Mike Sukach

His house once lit up like the word ambulance, birthday, or sex...he, he had cancer that he flew to Boston and made prestigious in some medical journal...

She hypercorrected her own speech and never could finish a crossword...she lost her husband then sold everything he ever owned, had their house painted, and hadn't spoken to any one of us since...

He frolicked and screwed up the complete sentence structure of conversations...he flew helicopters in Iraq and usually stood behind his wife at parties...

She had six dogs on six leashes who were liberated from shelters...she worked in a vet clinic (not soldiers but pets and wildlife) and watered every single plant in her yard individually...

His death interrupted our broken after-work talk about nothing in particular...he had Alzheimer's, bludgeoned his wife once, and couldn't remember home...

She was convinced that butterflies were conscientious about their syntax...she shaved her pubic hair into a prefect "V" as if it were half the chiasmic letter "X" or something with wings...

He never said much after the sixth grade and too many fist fights...to tell the truth, he had an incondite vocabulary, taught Shakespeare and Bukowski together, and was humbled at the thought that people talked about him behind his back.

______________________

PRELUDE
—Mike Sukach


blueberry colored eyes

plum sex

the first aspects

of your figure

I encounter

reaching

in for the one

Fuji apple

in a cart full

that hung

as if plucked

from the leafing

branch of your arm

the stem pinched

between your fingers

the soft S

slithering

from the bough

of your tongue

to insist

_____________________

Thanks to Mike Sukach for today's poetry and pix! About himself, Mike writes: I am seventeen years into my career as an officer in the United States Air Force and, as such, a veteran of numerous wars and conflicts, most of them familiar despite the hyperbole with which they are too often declared and subsequently rendered unrecognizable. At the moment, I live in Colorado Springs, teach writing and literature at the United States Air Force Academy, and direct the Air force Professional Writers Workshop.

Currently, Mike has fiction forthcoming in the 2012 Winter edition of Ontologica and The Citron Review. His poetry has appeared in The Blast Furnace and his poem, “Invocation,” was recently selected as a finalist in the Sow’s Ear Poetry Review’s 2012 poetry competition. He also has poetry recently anthologized in Proud to Be: Writing by American Warriors, published by Southeast Missouri State University Press. Take a closer look: www.mksukach.com.

_____________________

Today's LittleNip:

a day in the life
—Mike Sukach

no, i'm not making you another saucer of coffee... 
dogs don't have regrets, i don’t think... 
stop looking at me like that... 
i heard you the first time...
why don't you ever pee on her side of the bed... 
quit fussing, lay down... 
you can't drive, get off the wheel...
i don't know what that look means...
you smell like bologna... 
i'm not sure why you don't like other dogs... 
i haven't seen your ball... 
well, if the shower is on, you're getting in... 
yes, dog is god backwards but... 
i'm not sure why you have more than one name... 
it’s late, go to sleep already...

i know your ears hurt... 
i'm trying

_____________________

—Medusa

Trying to Enlighten Us

Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park

PEACE GARDEN
—B.Z. Niditch, Brookline, MA

In the evasive sunset
where day skies leave
my memory ensconced
in immobile thoughts
once again
lacerating Hiroshima
in a sudden flash
of grotesque moments
shattering bodies
of dappled red
blood letting
through the ashen air
when birds disappear
in the black clouds
blistering my memory
as my eyes open
doves return
here on a park bench
in the peace garden
hiding and camouflaged
from the scent
of charred rugosa roses
surprising the traces
of nameless souls
like balloons of vapor
in the rubble of roads
from the first trajectory
touching us
from unknown
wake-up calls
with the all clear
sounding like mirrors
of flesh shattered
in a celestial universe
at an earth-wise time
trying to enlighten us
by the grey monument
near the fountains
of luminous waters.

_______________________

—Medusa

 

The Furniture of the Emotions

Baxter's Cattle Feeding

MESSAGE

First there were fires that scattered the villages
Far and wide.  So many languages came upon
Us that it became most difficult for us to understand
One another.  The fires made a night that lasted
A long time.  We often walked long distances
Singing songs we invented during the night.

Recently we have been able to see the sun.
It has made us want to find all of the others.
Once we saw many ships on the great waters,
Near the horizon.  We built fires to signal them
But they passed before us headed to the west.

To prepare ourselves we have created dances,
Plays and three spectacles including many animals
We have come to know and speak to as friends.

Our dances allow these animals to come into
Our bodies and speak directly to us, telling us
About our relationships to ourselves and others.
We wear masks at these times so that we may
Leave our bodies empty for their spirits to come
To us.  We have found we must do this as it is
Difficult to speak to them otherwise.  They are

Guides and messengers.  We have learned
May things from them.  We fear this information
May be lost.  The buffalo, the eagle, the deer,
The antelope: the ways we share with one another
Are many and quite complex.  Even when we
Meet our brothers, we must depend on these dances.

There are many signs telling us that much will
Be lost,  Even these words coming so late through
The spirit may seem quaint and unimportant
To you as you read them.  Please.  They are not.
Listen to one another.  Try to hear this.  Wear
Masks if you are able.  Gather together with
Your friends.  Your bodies can carry messages
Far beyond what you may imagine.  You do not
Need to be more than to be in love with this world
For this to happen.  Surely you are able to do
This.  Surely this is why you are here now.

_____________________

A FROZEN LIGHT



Far down from the North a wraith


Draped in ice came floating.



It was without a name.  It was


Without a claim to any knowledge


That might feign describe its glow.



For light itself was locked inside


Its resemblance to a soul and this


Leaked upon the land, to silvered


Fields and frozen meadowlands.



We were later told it was the soul


That Winter drags across the world


With its spare and haunting songs


Or, terrified by great winds


Drives a blindness of snow before


Itself and slides on the edge of morning


To show up worlds of white


On trees and water both.

 



The snap of names inside the frozen


Voice it uses to call across this stark, stark place


And rises up in a swirl of white


As if it were the frozen smile


Legends clamor to be when we


Are gathered here together in


Small stone shelters with our sheep



At night and gaze out upon a million,


Million stars and the soft voices


The sheep offer to this white that echoes 


Their own white fleece.



All of this we will never know


For we come here within the ice.


We come as wraith to the seasons


Man denotes as he lifts his


Boot-clad feet, pushing past the drifts,


Believing he too is moving


Through such a perfect soul.

___________________

NIGHTMARE

It’s this road.  No, it’s that one.
I enter the room.  It is a huge
Open room, all wood, with a bar
At one end. Two or three people
Are drinking, one of them is standing.

“So did you find your mother?’
The men in the gray suits inquire.
“What are you talking about?’ I ask

“Look at your hands, boy.” someone says.
I do.  They are red with blood.
It drips on my pants.  I begin to cry.

“You’ve got a lot of nerve coming
In here.” he says.  “You need a lot
More than just a drink.”

I look across the room.  A heavenly
Light pours in through the door.
“This way please,” the light says.
We will all be home before morning.”

_______________________

WE ARE SO MUCH WITH THE DEAD

Can’t even pry my mouth open.
I am pained by the tenacity of the dead.
I find them in books, like black bulls
Hurling themselves again and again,
Trying to be lightning as I sit
On the veranda of the house and see
Real lightning in the sky across the pampas.

I can uncouple them, attach them to
What I dream, to evenings they never saw,
Call them to life again, keep them
Under the roof, Borges, Dickinson,
Patchen, Stevens, levy, the lot.

And they will think they have shadows
Once again, fill my roving spirit with their luggage,
Arm me with their words.  I will take them
Gladly, happy to be full of such a crowd.
And we shall once again
Be together as we watch
The lightning gain on us.

In Baxter's Barn

CRASH VISION

I had a memory of a fence made
From human skulls that fled from me
When I realized it was not just
The dreaming crowding into the emergency
Rooms, pushing past triage, shoving gurneys
Into the halls, the intravenous lines
Disconnected and spurting their
Clear and not so clear fluids.

We have done all we can, dear friends.
Those of you who still can walk
Should get out of the place while
You still are able.  Sirens shrieking
Across the nights.  Lights begin to wash
The yellow walls just before emergency
Power comes on.  This one’s medications
Need to be adjusted.  He is hallucinating.

The car skids sideways, broadsiding into
A bridge abutment.  There are other
Bodies here, lit by many burning automobiles.

______________________

PLACE NAMES:  THE PLACE 

            for N.E. Gotthart

Dry flames eat
into the passages
of the heart.

There is no room here.
Turning as to the plane
of eternal thought
without seeing thru
the butter of it all;
the subtle closing of one
eye, questions asked
of the storm until the spirit
wavers, clouds and descends
as into a shower of pearls.

Tears and tears and still
more.  The furniture of the emotions
is shuffled and regrouped,
made to look as if home
was where I love you’s came from
or went out to.
I was never quite sure
which one, if either.

So the flames crisp
up the edges of fry life
and seek new apartments.
Far beyond
the body with its fleshy
dreams and admirations.
Here, for instance, in these words
we can come together, alone
for awhile and gaze
into the glass at the
fires rolling among the mysteries
and know it is ourselves
who venture thru
unable to dream again presently,
like a night without stars
wavering and still.

(first pub. in Cruisin’ at the Limit from

Duck Down Press, Fallon, NV, 1982)

_____________________
             
THEY HAD GIVEN ME A HANDFUL OF STARS

and told me I could go down to the lake
when the evening grew long and toss them
out across the water so’s to watch
the colors they would make.

It grew quite loud in the dream.
I couldn’t drive them back
with my voice.  Sound had abandoned
all things and the ropes of joy
lashed out at me.  No one would
ever get home from this one.
I looked at their eyes.

When I saw you walking along the shoreline
I was already too tired to hear anymore.
You looked as if someone had managed
to fill you up with children playing alone
on rainy afternoons.  The wind moved your
dress like a thousand flags
excited by the parade of you.
I began to throw the stars out
across the river.

She was next to me watching them skip
and sputter and finally shine deep within
the lake, wavering.  “All these stars,” she
said “what for?"  And the dogs began snapping
at my ankles and I wanted to throw them all
in her face and scream at her.  “You
don’t need stars in here at all," she said.

And I, I continued to toss them one by one
until the whole night was lit up bright
as any room, all the while looking into
her eyes at the reflections.  Silver lances
stuck in the sand, we remained motionless
like this, somehow outside time and still
creatures of it.

(first pub. in Cruisin’ at the Limit from

Duck Down Press, Fallon, NV, 1982)

______________________

Today's LittleNip:

The mind is its own place, and in itself, 

Can make a Heav'n of Hell, A Hell of Heav'n.

—John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book 1

______________________

—Medusa, with thanks to D.R. Wagner for today's poetry and pix, and a reminder to scroll down to our blue bulletin board at the right of this column to check out all the poetry action in our area today! D.R. is reading this afternoon (with J.T. Odochartaigh) at Sac. Poetry Center; Crossroads is having its last reading this afternoon (JoAnn Anglin and Graciela Ramirez); or you can attend the Poetic License read-around in El Dorado (just south of Placerville); and tonight NSAA hosts Anna Marie, again at SPC. So many choices...

A Congress of Leaves