Poet's Corner

[midcan5]

'Doubting Thomas'

"Call me Infidel, or just call me Tom.
Call me handsome, call me cold, call me bitter, call me cad

call me No-Better-Than-Judas-Iscariot
call me bachelor, call me saint, call me numb.

I was abused, I was married, I took pills, I was left,
I was in love, I was a liar, I was a drunk, I was in debt,

I wrote a book, I had some fame, then I was dead,
‘til I was saved, I slept around, I was too young, I was bereft.

You are good, you are beautiful, you are kind, you forgive,
you are loving, you are smart, you’re adored and you are brave.

There’s no one else. It isn’t you. I’m circumspect. I’m full of doubt.
It wouldn’t work. We’re not alike. I don’t know what I want.

Call me weak, call me ingrate, call me ‘once bitten, twice shy.’
Call me anything, but please don’t say I make you want to die."

Kathryn Maris

 

[midcan5]

'A Hundred Bolts of Satin'

"All you
have to lose
is one
connection
and the mind
uncouples
all the way back.
It seems
to have been
a train.
There seems
to have been
a track.
The things
that you
unpack
from the
abandoned cars
cannot sustain
life: a crate of
tractor axles,
for example,
a dozen dozen
clasp knives,
a hundred
bolts of satin—
perhaps you
specialized
more than
you imagined."

Kay Ryan

 

[midcan5]

'Finish These Sentences'

"The qualities I look for in a subordinate are

A situation in which humor might be most unwelcome is

After considering which is better, to be wealthy or wise

My greatest sense of personal fulfillment depends on

It’s one thing to champion a sticky empiricism
But it’s another altogether different thing to

I think of myself as a caring professional who as the days
And nights tumble by like woozy pandas trying to achieve
A position conducive to procreation

She had an accent that turned eyes to ice, heart
to hard, and transubstantiation to

From the bloody throats of those dull-colored birds
That scream at the sun,

As a patch of grass and wildflowers where lovers lay
Begins to revive, so too my mind once oppressed by joy


In that one moment when they begin to flap
Frantically in their doomed arc, the great books I fling
Off a high balcony almost

A complete individual is one who

Now there are hands, lovely hands that have played
Rare instruments in the dark and thrown
Many a burning basket into the wind, and there are eyes

I like to think my superiors value my ability to

It is easy for me first thing in the morning to scoff
At questions like how many angels can dance on a pinhead,
But such figments, especially when immersed in paradox,
Oxymora and the like, don’t seem so frivolous when we
Recollect the most intense and memorable experiences of our
Lives, experiences that in one moment produce a state of
Devastating superflux, of many simultaneous, powerful and
Distinct if not contradictory feelings, that when captured
In words not only allow the closest thing to prayer that the
Faithless can rely on for solace, but also remind us how
Figurative speech provides a refined atavistic satisfaction,
Especially evident in the way deeply imagined metaphor by
Enlivening objects reawakens the residual susceptibility
Of the primitive, superstitious mind to fetishism and "

Paul Violi

 

[freedombecki]

ode to yellowstone park

o'er northwest tannish cliffs of old
yon amber sawtooth, yea behold
bubbling spirits boil't on high
escaping earth to seek the sky
making groves of aspens shake
quiv'ring till their shadows quake
bighorns scale orthog'nal walls
enigmas spritz the bride's veil falls
aspiring spruce and lowly sage
turn many a man's soul-weary page
reviving sons and daughters fair
inhaling bracing mountain air
to view the witch's cauldron bowl
we might know need for saving soul
and speaking thus of gratefulness
we mustn't swim old faithfulness
yet we might try two-ocean lake
averting bears with cow bell shake
avoid the bison cute and sweet
or you could quick thy maker meet
and moose abuse will get you grief
stay in the car, to make it brief
mosquitoes there have brutal stakes
as potent as the oil of snakes
yet cool and sleek jenny lake lays
below the peaks where sweet fawn plays
ah, yellowstone thy greatest worth
where tetons tower o'er the earth
is in refreshing, fragrant plant
and awesomeness as geysers rant
04.20.11
​

 

[midcan5]

'A Ball Rolls on a Point'

"The whole ball
of who we are
presses into
the green baize
at a single tiny
spot. An aural
track of crackle
betrays our passage
through the
fibrous jungle.
It’s hot and
desperate. Insects
spring out of it.
The pressure is
intense, and the
sense that we’ve
lost proportion.
As though bringing
too much to bear
too locally were
our decision."

Kay Ryan

 

[freedombecki]

sonnet on glacier blue

the glacier cup when held to light doth please
its maker who so honored lake louise
o color blue as my beloved's eye
much truer than the transcendental sky

sweet ringing from a quick flicked fingernail
the azure goblet chimes her dulcet knell
to drink the purest water from high spring
is quaffing goodness garret warblers sing

the mountains climbed by nimble-footed sheep
adorn the cliffs of dreams filling my sleep
by day the sun gleams on new-fallen snow
at night the starlight brings my heart in tow
which swells on thought of vision of my love
for crystal aqua heavens up above

09.14.07​

 

[midcan5]

'I am'

"I am a daughter and a sister.
I wonder when I will die.
I hear the warm weather coming.
I see stars in the day.
I want to learn my whole ballet dance.
I am a daughter and a sister.

I pretend to be a teacher at home.
I feel like I am a teacher.
I touch hands that are growing.
I worry that I will never change.
I cry when something or someone dies.
I am a daughter and a sister.

I understand that teachers work hard for students.
I say that I don’t like bullies.
I dream about me not moving while trying really hard to run.
I try to become a good friend.
I hope that there is no more dying or killing.
I am a daughter and a sister."

Ava Schicke

(Eight-year-old Ava Schicke, who lives in Omaha, Nebraska, tells us just who she is and what she thinks.)

 

[midcan5]

'Mama, Come Back'

"Mama, come back.
Why did you leave
now that I am learning you?
The landlady next door
how she apologizes
for my rough brown skin
to her tenant from Hong Kong
as if I were her daughter,
as if she were you.

How do I say I miss you
your scolding
your presence
your roast loin of pork
more succulent, more tender
than any hotel chef's?

The fur coat you wanted
making you look like a polar bear
and the mink-trimmed coat
I once surprised you
on Christmas morning.

Mama, how you said "importment"
for important,
your gold tooth flashing
an insecurity you dared not bare,
wanting recognition
simply as eating noodles
and riding in a motor car
to the supermarket
the movie theater
adorned in your gold and jade
as if all your jewelry
confirmed your identity
a Chinese woman in America.

How you said "you better"
always your last words
glazed through your dark eyes
following me fast as you could
one November evening in New York City
how I thought "Hello, Dolly!"
showed you an America
you never saw.

How your fear of being alone
kept me dutiful in body
resentful in mind.
How my fear of being single
kept me
from moving out.

How I begged your forgiveness
after that one big fight
how I wasn't wrong
but needed you to love me
as warmly as you hugged strangers."

Nellie Wong

 

[midcan5]

'Facing It'

"My black face fades,
hiding inside the black granite.
I said I wouldn't,
dammit: No tears.
I'm stone. I'm flesh.
My clouded reflection eyes me
like a bird of prey, the profile of night
slanted against morning. I turn
this way--the stone lets me go.
I turn that way--I'm inside
the Vietnam Veterans Memorial
again, depending on the light
to make a difference.
I go down the 58,022 names,
half-expecting to find
my own in letters like smoke.
I touch the name Andrew Johnson;
I see the booby trap's white flash.
Names shimmer on a woman's blouse
but when she walks away
the names stay on the wall.
Brushstrokes flash, a red bird's
wings cutting across my stare.
The sky. A plane in the sky.
A white vet's image floats
closer to me, then his pale eyes
look through mine. I'm a window.
He's lost his right arm
inside the stone. In the black mirror
a woman's trying to erase names:
No, she's brushing a boy's hair."

Yusef Komunyakaa

 

[freedombecki]

expatiating thunder rips heaven
terrifying craven soul like leaven
sentinel of earth defeating drought plain
bringing desert bare benevolent rain
roaring, shaking rattle of sky's marrow
thrown behind the lightning's blinding arrow
plangent drums routing solace throughout town
filling park and alley with surround sound
wise men run for cover from the deluge
wasting nothing till they find a refuge
sycophant of dissonance tags along
demanding swift justice for ev'ry wrong
pretending the earth should e'er be mellow
can you say he is a naive fellow
whether you prefer to saunter or rush
thor's cacophony retreats and leaves hush
earth in quietude may ever respond
thor reciprocates by filling fish pond
05.12.11
​

 

[midcan5]

Whatever happened to Fire Flies? We used to see them everywhere.


'A Beautiful Thing'

"Don't you remember that snowy December when we went to see "Singing in the Rain"? I shouldn't have smuggled in that bottle of gin because after the film, I could barely walk. But, darling don't you know it's only human to want to kill a beautiful thing. When I was seven summer lasted forever. I used to chase fire flies through the woods. Tiny green lights circling warm August nights. I'd catch them inside a washed-out old jar. I dreamed of the stars with the jar by my bed, but each morning my pretty bugs were dead. We should have been dancing like lovers in a movie, but I fell and cut my head in the snow. I wanted to tell you all the ways that I loved you but, instead I got sick on the train."

Rennie Sparks

 

[midcan5]

'Friends' Photos'

"We all looked like goddesses
and gods, glowing and smooth, sheathed
from head to foot by a golden essence
that glistened and refracted its aura
of power - the wonderful ichor called youth.

We moved as easily as dolphins
surging out of the ocean, cleaving
massed tons of transparent water
streaming away in swathes of bubbling
silver like the plasm of life.

Still potent from those black and white
photos, the palpable electric
charge between us, like the negative
and positive poles of a battery,
or the fingers of Adam and God.

We were beautiful, without exception.
I could hardly bear to look at those
old albums, to see the lost glamour
we never noticed when we were
first together - when we were young."

Ruth Fainlight

 

[freedombecki]

i
saw
today
a hundred
cattle egrets
of African descent
pondering my afternoon clearing
of weeds
on the fence line
at the neighbor's woods.
they well knew what i was doing
they knew fires were raging across the friendship state
they knew i was preventing our house, pond, buildings and fields
from any fires that could start here tomorrow
the caution danger level has been declared "extreme"
if the mowed fire line helps stop embers from falling to one of our trees
we will have safety
but if the winds blow hot and harshly
a fire could roar past my feeble efforts
but the cattle egrets knew what was on my mind
maybe their flights presented them the facts of a million scorched acres
they knew and they didn't fly away like they usually do when they hear
the drumming of a riding mower for four consecutive hours
i thought of my stellar morning sewing sturdy quilted pillows for nursing home residents who need support
not
even
aware
of egrets​

04.22.11

 

[freedombecki]

o dearest kindred carry me
whene'er i die to lone prairie
remote and wild where wind blows free
as i find cheer in reverie

sometimes when feeling so alone
i discoursed god on direct phone
no one else could soften moan
or comfort fibro's constant bone

wandering's best away from fence
ah thinking thus should soften sense
remains rising in spite of rain
the here and now fracas of pain

too often crying from my bed
when hurt was thought to be in head
at least out there, the answers be
where freedom stays the last of me
​

 

[midcan5]

'Robin In Flight'

"Let’s imagine for a second that the robin
is not a contained entity moving at speed
through space, but that it is a living change,
unmaking and remaking itself over and over
by sheer unconscious will, and that
if we were to slow down the film enough
we would see a flying ball of chaos,
flicking particles like Othello counters,
air turning to beak in front just as tail transforms to air behind,
a living being flinging its changes at a still universe.

This would require infinite alignments. Each molecule
privy to the code of its possible settings,
the capacity of a blade of grass to become
the shadow of a falling apple by pure force
of the tree’s instinct. Every speck of world with the potential
to become stone, dog’s breath, light twisted through glass,
filth under fingernails, the skin’s bend at the bullet’s
nudge the moment before impact,
the thought of a robin in flight,
the thought of the thought of a robin in flight."

Paul Adrian

 

[midcan5]

'How You Know'

"How do you know if it’s love? she asks,
and I think if you have to ask, it’s not,
but I know this won’t help. I want to say
you’re too young to worry about it,
as if she has questions about Medicare
or social security, but this won’t help either.
“You’ll just know” is a lie, and one truth,
“when you still want to be with them
the next morning,” would involve too
many follow-up questions. The difficulty
with love, I want to say, is sometimes
you only know afterwards that it’s arrived
or left. Love is the elephant and we
are the blind mice unable to understand
the whole. I want to say love is this
desire to help even when I know I can’t,
just as I couldn’t explain electricity, stars,
the color of the sky, baldness, tornadoes,
fingernails, coconuts, or the other things
she has asked about over the years, all
those phenomena whose daily existence
seems miraculous. Instead I shake my head.
I don’t even know how to match my socks.
Go ask your mother. She laughs and says,
I did. Mom told me to come and ask you."

Joe Mills

 

[midcan5]

I still remember mom, who is dying, ironing our white shirts for hours because catholic school is where we had to go. She would sprinkle water on them and pull them one by one from her basket.


'Ironing After Midnight'

"Your mother called it
"doing the pressing,"
and you know now
how right she was.
There is something urgent here.
Not even the hiss
under each button
or the yellow business
ground in at the neck
can make one instant
of this work seem unimportant.
You've been taught
to turn the pocket corners
and pick out the dark lint
that collects there.
You're tempted to leave it,
but the old lessons
go deeper than habits.
Everyone else is asleep.
The odor of sweat rises
when you do
under the armpits,
the owner's particular smell
you can never quite wash out.
You'll stay up.
You'll have your way,
the final stroke
and sharpness
down the long sleeves,
a truly permanent edge."

Marsha Truman Cooper

 

[smokin_kat]

'How You Know'

"How do you know if it’s love? she asks,
and I think if you have to ask, it’s not,
but I know this won’t help. I want to say
you’re too young to worry about it,
as if she has questions about Medicare
or social security, but this won’t help either.
“You’ll just know” is a lie, and one truth,
“when you still want to be with them
the next morning,” would involve too
many follow-up questions. The difficulty
with love, I want to say, is sometimes
you only know afterwards that it’s arrived
or left. Love is the elephant and we
are the blind mice unable to understand
the whole. I want to say love is this
desire to help even when I know I can’t,
just as I couldn’t explain electricity, stars,
the color of the sky, baldness, tornadoes,
fingernails, coconuts, or the other things
she has asked about over the years, all
those phenomena whose daily existence
seems miraculous. Instead I shake my head.
I don’t even know how to match my socks.
Go ask your mother. She laughs and says,
I did. Mom told me to come and ask you."

Joe Mills

This is fantastic. I love it.

 

[midcan5]

'Childhood'

"In my aquarium the fish went round
and round—kissing fish and clown fish
and one very blue fish with a mouth grimmer
than Grandfather, whom we could offend
without knowing. Then no amount of running
next door to beg through the locked screen,
what did I do? would help. No amount of
saying sorry, stammering on the first
snakelike S sizzling into frayed rope.

No amount of whistling to our dog Ruff
would make him stay and not race across fields
as if running were breathing to him.
But we wanted to fondle and smooch,
to throw sticks for him to fetch right back.
We chained him up because we loved him.
Grandfather must have felt this way about
whatever was inside his head he never let out,
his long list of reasons to be bitter,

that gene he fattened and passed on
to three generations, which probably was
passed on to him, locked midway in the chain,
since his own father caught an infection
from a horse and died just days after
conceiving him. Plant matter to coal, coal
to diamond—things pressed down long enough
turn hard, then somebody finds them precious
and snarls or hisses when you get close.

I really thought if I stood outside and stared
till I saw the exact moment the streetlight
came on, my dog would speak, my fish would
let me hold his golden fin-flutter to my lips,
and my own dead father would step out from
the vanishing point at the end of our street.
It was winter, so what I got was frostbite
and a weeping mother bathing my hands
in pans of cool water. But what if

we could reel through our memories
to the exact moment before the salt
went into the wound, that moment of pure
perception before the hardening began?
Leaning from her arms to hand an apple
to a horse’s brown teeth and velvet nose,
laughing at its warm breath—“Little Miracle”
my grandfather was then, child number ten,
birthed out of his mother’s long black clothes."

Betsy Sholl

 

[midcan5]

'Cheerful Defense of the Realm'

"Once I used to be and desperately wanted,
but in the beginning I wondered,
though once upon a time I secretly knew.
At first I declared; then I believed.
After a while I noticed, but not enough.
In the end I still wanted. In the middle
I was lost, very lost. In the meantime
I complained. As a general rule I felt.

When it was over, I gently explained
how I had guessed according to the stars.
Apropos of nothing I apologize.
With hindsight I throw up my hands in praise.
Under the circumstances, I’ll take another.
Given a second chance, I’d choose the blue."

Helen Wickes