old milk go biscuits
emaciated briquettes
dried apricots plums
cranberries revived
blessed water go biscuits
a dry run for coming famine
famine elsewhere
coming home to lie
with we who have enough
for now famine chases
farm factory workers
too sick to work
too sick to not
falling dead in furrows
falling dead at conveyors
falling dead at cutting
blocks stolen away greedy
combines’ viscous mowing
spit out in bales
buried during dark
moon’s moaning
bitter harvest
Friday, May 29, 2020
poem 51
old climbing rose played out
grey canes split drought
rains heavy and late
streamers not drops
plummet pound
fragile universe erupts
tiny soft green stars
...
...
revision 5/29/20
grey canes split drought
rains heavy and late
streamers not drops
plummet pound
fragile universe erupts
tiny soft green stars
...
...
revision 5/29/20
poem 50
memory treacherous
memory all we have
clanging cellular accounts
letters tossed gone awry
how crammed purpose
destroys aspiration
risks block sales
chains forced steps
commingles what we know
with what we wish
with what they want us to remember
resilience relies upon surviving loss
no where else to lay our heads
only on slipping pillows
of stories told at dusk
luminous at dawn
memory all we have
clanging cellular accounts
letters tossed gone awry
how crammed purpose
destroys aspiration
risks block sales
chains forced steps
commingles what we know
with what we wish
with what they want us to remember
resilience relies upon surviving loss
no where else to lay our heads
only on slipping pillows
of stories told at dusk
luminous at dawn
Saturday, May 23, 2020
poem 49
old grey climber dead
thick split canes bark
at late rains come heavy
streamers not droplets
plummeting pounding
mere days fragile green
unfurls lifts sunward
thick split canes bark
at late rains come heavy
streamers not droplets
plummeting pounding
mere days fragile green
unfurls lifts sunward
poem 48
There is no return to Then.
There is only Now.
what i make
what you make
what we make
Then—fantasy
when in actuality
what we lost
is freedom to hug
anyone everyone
we carry what we always carry
crazy quilt of love joy regret guilt
unfathomable ecstasy despair
burning agonies soothing peace
bottoming out comfort solitude
communal leaning family
broken or thickly stranded
war jealousy hate cruelty
driven achievements hollow
useless dying glows we burnish
cup hands around flames we
imagine not existent insistent
love carries us unless we succumb
in sinful seas of greed tempting us
beyond reason still there’s love
all this and far more we carry
what we have no real words for
what we long to set down
and do not dare not too afraid
of being suddenly freed trapped
Forever
Now—an enormous yawning universe
takes a breath we lean away from
want to stifle as we run terrified run
wildly towards when given courage
by bright new days rainy shiny dawns
we want to race across deserts as if distant
ranges of possibility hold only comfort
prosperity without risks challenges
new griefs new moral dilemmas
complexities we can not yet see
as if we can leave all that far behind
as far behind as our fantasized Then
we so long for tie our ankles to
selectively dragging a web of longing
there is no return yet time measures us
as it pours through ancestors fingers
let fall what may lean into their ghost
arms lay our heads on their broad misty
shoulders their whispers echo vibrate
our breasts warns us keep potatoes from
rot yourself from moral blight and greed
your life only a tossed grain rippling rings
no greater no less than any other grain
winds whisper winds whisper winds whisper
remember Love remember Love remember Love
There is only Now.
what i make
what you make
what we make
Then—fantasy
when in actuality
what we lost
is freedom to hug
anyone everyone
we carry what we always carry
crazy quilt of love joy regret guilt
unfathomable ecstasy despair
burning agonies soothing peace
bottoming out comfort solitude
communal leaning family
broken or thickly stranded
war jealousy hate cruelty
driven achievements hollow
useless dying glows we burnish
cup hands around flames we
imagine not existent insistent
love carries us unless we succumb
in sinful seas of greed tempting us
beyond reason still there’s love
all this and far more we carry
what we have no real words for
what we long to set down
and do not dare not too afraid
of being suddenly freed trapped
Forever
Now—an enormous yawning universe
takes a breath we lean away from
want to stifle as we run terrified run
wildly towards when given courage
by bright new days rainy shiny dawns
we want to race across deserts as if distant
ranges of possibility hold only comfort
prosperity without risks challenges
new griefs new moral dilemmas
complexities we can not yet see
as if we can leave all that far behind
as far behind as our fantasized Then
we so long for tie our ankles to
selectively dragging a web of longing
there is no return yet time measures us
as it pours through ancestors fingers
let fall what may lean into their ghost
arms lay our heads on their broad misty
shoulders their whispers echo vibrate
our breasts warns us keep potatoes from
rot yourself from moral blight and greed
your life only a tossed grain rippling rings
no greater no less than any other grain
winds whisper winds whisper winds whisper
remember Love remember Love remember Love
poem 47
memory treacherous
memory all we have
after
hanging cellular accounts
letters tossed awry
crammed purpose destroys
commercializes commingles
aspiration violence innocence
loss
nowhere to lay our heads except
on slipping pillows stories told at dusk
memory all we have
after
hanging cellular accounts
letters tossed awry
crammed purpose destroys
commercializes commingles
aspiration violence innocence
loss
nowhere to lay our heads except
on slipping pillows stories told at dusk
Friday, May 8, 2020
Monday, May 4, 2020
poem 45
Itza Wildin flew
right off rails
bucking under
restraint hanging
swinging breasts
crack her heart
a hairsuit crabbed
together unspeakable
long known wounds
ignored
Itza Wildin lumbers
when not flying
as if slowness
saves a moment
if not a day
pretending
stillness shines
buttercups new
blown
as if plain light
were enough
until it is
right off rails
bucking under
restraint hanging
swinging breasts
crack her heart
a hairsuit crabbed
together unspeakable
long known wounds
ignored
Itza Wildin lumbers
when not flying
as if slowness
saves a moment
if not a day
pretending
stillness shines
buttercups new
blown
as if plain light
were enough
until it is
poem 44
Itza Wildin took
to invisibility
pacing dodging
mental combines
lumbering across
her soulbrain
stretched out
a disappearing
ravaged geography
where winds whip
green oats still
heady with Spring
blades spin roar
devour remnants
as if thrashed hopes
winnowed passions
never existed
to invisibility
pacing dodging
mental combines
lumbering across
her soulbrain
stretched out
a disappearing
ravaged geography
where winds whip
green oats still
heady with Spring
blades spin roar
devour remnants
as if thrashed hopes
winnowed passions
never existed
Sunday, May 3, 2020
poem 42
if a long breath running the entire
geographies of lungs pushing ribs
to meet Buddha at crossroads
of acceptance what lies ahead
a mystery of line interrupted exhales
if a breath running third eye to toe tip
stumbles on ego unchecked clutters
catches on exhale convulsively
coughs stuttering staggering on
pretending nothing wrong sighs
if a long breath runs head on
into grief bound muscles frozen
nerves afraid of release in terror
of acceptance wilted buds empty
promises exhausts nothing
if a long breath unexpectedly relieves
heart bleats slow blood falls down
pools in flattened arches stills
heels no impatient taps soles
quiet not running away freely exhales
geographies of lungs pushing ribs
to meet Buddha at crossroads
of acceptance what lies ahead
a mystery of line interrupted exhales
if a breath running third eye to toe tip
stumbles on ego unchecked clutters
catches on exhale convulsively
coughs stuttering staggering on
pretending nothing wrong sighs
if a long breath runs head on
into grief bound muscles frozen
nerves afraid of release in terror
of acceptance wilted buds empty
promises exhausts nothing
if a long breath unexpectedly relieves
heart bleats slow blood falls down
pools in flattened arches stills
heels no impatient taps soles
quiet not running away freely exhales
Saturday, May 2, 2020
poem 40
i can not go to the streams
but the winged ones come sing
morning on morning on morning
now a few days beyond mating
in hidden precious nests
hopes pulse within calcite stars
aligned and stacked
hard thin fragile ellipsis
wait cracking [an inside job]
tiny beaks hammer and hammer
for oxygen and light and night
stars realign in pinpoints
where angels might dance
bursting crackling thin lines
lightening thunders within
an incredulous moment
blooming shards hinge away
rapture tumbles out and rolls
a universe of hungry wet feathers
April 30, 2020
but the winged ones come sing
morning on morning on morning
now a few days beyond mating
in hidden precious nests
hopes pulse within calcite stars
aligned and stacked
hard thin fragile ellipsis
wait cracking [an inside job]
tiny beaks hammer and hammer
for oxygen and light and night
stars realign in pinpoints
where angels might dance
bursting crackling thin lines
lightening thunders within
an incredulous moment
blooming shards hinge away
rapture tumbles out and rolls
a universe of hungry wet feathers
April 30, 2020
poem 39
making black coffee Eavan Boland
toasting a biscuit Eavan Boland
spilling hot coffee while
walking in your poems
Eavan Boland died Monday
in Dublin in Dublin two maps
mother daughter wife professor
provocateur poet
You gave me the dead end roads
where lies my heritage hid in verdant
tangles and rocky highlands where
blighted potatoes rotted
where my starving slave ancestors
cut roads with no end in sight
died shovels in hands rocks
in hands left to rot where they fell
You versed our stories
gave we women place
within the Irish canon
where Heaney and Yeats
and their brothers live on
where you now dwell
April 29, 2020
toasting a biscuit Eavan Boland
spilling hot coffee while
walking in your poems
Eavan Boland died Monday
in Dublin in Dublin two maps
mother daughter wife professor
provocateur poet
You gave me the dead end roads
where lies my heritage hid in verdant
tangles and rocky highlands where
blighted potatoes rotted
where my starving slave ancestors
cut roads with no end in sight
died shovels in hands rocks
in hands left to rot where they fell
You versed our stories
gave we women place
within the Irish canon
where Heaney and Yeats
and their brothers live on
where you now dwell
April 29, 2020
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