Watermark

At Sixty

The lilac tree should have grown over the last fifteen years, but a June snow took out a third of it, and it's just now filling out again. The birches died, and have been replaced by young saplings. Spike is slipping away from me, nothing but bones and orange fur and purrs.

In this diminishing world, I hear each day of catastrophes, cyclones, earthquakes, drought and starvation; and closer to home, fires, floods, tornadoes. Extinctions, pending and past.

As a child, I knew of these only at a distance, miles away, and long ago. Now, each tragedy comes as it happens, into my living room, where I sit in comfort and watch children who are not mine buried in rubble, caught in crossfire, too starved to be afraid.

My garden stands up in the rain. The lilac is budding. Crocus and tulips decorate the neighborhood. I know this will not last. The crocus will pass, the tulips, Spike will be buried in the flowerbed. The lilac will flower and go to seed.

Now, I close my eyes and hold my cat.

stones on the ground
    the garden wall
     is falling
  

Snapshot Poem 16 April 02008

B --

When I walked along the dike tonight
there was the smell of ice in the air.
Snow brushed the foot of the mountain.
The wildlife was quiet - no gossiping
geese, no chattering ducks, no beaver
splashing into the water to keep
pace with me. Only the shushing
of the river, and a sound like wolves, 
howling.

            How different this must be
from where you are. Awake, I try
to call your face to my mind, but
it's blurred; it could be the face of any
of the men I've loved. But asleep, you
are there, complete, completely
yourself. I imagine walking the paths
you walk. The colors, the wildness,
the strangeness of you

            in that place. The slowness
of elephants, their surprising hair. Such
gentleness, such patience. Delicate,
spangled shawls on the shoulders of
great and dangerous power. Temple bells.
The calls to prayer. Fourteen years. I know
you have found demons, and faced them
down. Have you found angels? Have you
found peace?

 

Snapshot Poem 26 March 02008

It's spring again. The garden knows it. From beneath,
green and purple leaves, reaching up. Reaching out.

A winter vine climbs the fence. It separates the boards.
Strong and woody, it goes where it pleases. In all directions.

A Japanese lantern hangs on a steel hook. At night, long
winter nights, it warms the garden. I am not like other

people. I watch them, for clues. A woman passes by
with two small dogs on a leash. She smiles. Why?   

I go to the door and look through the glass. On the fence,
at my eye level, a black cat looks back at me. I open

the door, and the cat vanishes in an arc over the fence.
A squirrel eats buds from a scrap tree. A weed, aggressive,

but harmless in its own right, it feeds the tree rats, the various
birds. I am chased by a monster. It's kill or be killed. I am so weak

I can barely lift the hammer; the blow only cracks the monster's
bald skull. Like an egg, cracking. This happens many times, many

iterations. I find a green light and shine it on the monster. I sing it
a love song, and it dies, finally, peacefully. Sitting very still, I hold

my aging cat against my aging breasts. We both purr. With my
breath, we purr. I decide to allow deep pleasure back into my life.

A snow shovel stands against the wall. Unused, unneeded, this
warm spring. Everything has a function. We all do what we must.

Snapshot Poem, Spring Equinox

Worm Moon, Crow Moon

Crow Moon, tonight you fly
at the balance of the year,
half light, half dark, tipping
your wing toward spring.

Crow Moon, caw away
this winter, gnaw the last
crusts of snow from the
frozen garden. Shine

the earthworms up to
the surface. Worm Moon,
Crow Moon, Full Sap Moon,
wake us up once more.

Mar. 21, 2:40 p.m. EDT — Full Worm Moon. In this month the ground softens and the earthworm casts reappear, inviting the return of the robins. The more northern tribes knew this as the Full Crow Moon, when the cawing of crows signals the end of winter, or the Full Crust Moon because the snow cover becomes crusted from thawing by day and freezing at night. The Full Sap Moon, marking the time of tapping maple trees, is another variation. This is also the Paschal Full Moon; the first full moon of the spring season. The first Sunday following the Paschal Moon is Easter Sunday, which indeed will be observed two days later on Sunday, March 23. This will, in fact, be the earliest Easter since 1913.

       

12 March 02008 - Snapshot Poem

Richard

A chilly overcast day. One day
unfolds into the next. My brother
visits my dreams, one night folding
into the next. I think of his long bones,
the long bones of his fingers, shards
in the ashes. I think of his passion
for opera, the depth of his voice,
his mind folding one day into

the next. Sparrows calling from
the garden, scandal in the news,
mournful music on the radio. How
he loved Mozart, opera, Sondheim;
how his long legs loped through
the streets of Manhattan; how
that hole inside him could never
be filled; how he looms

in my dreams, tall and alive;
the inconsequence of our
conversation, the dead to the living,
the living to the dead, not noticing
how one folds into the other, folding
together, dream into dream, brother
into sister. How we light each other's
smokes. How light we are, how thin.

       

05 march 02008 snapshot poem

the moon is a sliver of silver
be still, you tell me
i sit

snow comes
thick, soft, glittery
i cannot catch it

it catches me
it grows around me
a pale and quiet burial

this is the only moment
snow comes
i am a stillness in the snow

i am
this darkness in the white world
i am sitting still

sparrows in the snow
sun comes, snow goes
i sit

Snapshot Poem

Another soggy day, 
air thickly inhabited
with portents

of coming change.
There, at the edge
of the visual field,

the far distance
of the audible wave,
a motion, a whisper

just caught 
by diminishing senses.
A touch at the earlobe,

a flicker on the eyelash.
I brush it away
with my fingertip.

Snapshot Poem

Photo by uncle mike in knoxville

Lunar Eclipse

Snow Moon, Hunger Moon,
for too long, the larders
have been empty.

The dead come to us
in dreams. They speak
but we cannot hear them.

The woods are quiet.
Only the hiss of spiders
in the snow.

The fire is banked.
The children sleep.
Cold sighs at the door.

Snow Moon,
Hunger Moon,
tonight the sky

will eat you.

 

Snapshot Poem 13 February 02008

winter rain
unsheathing

winter rain
brown ground emerges
from its snowy scabbard

goldfish rise drowsy
to the rippling surface
of their small pond
drift back down

puddles and dirty runnels
soak the flower beds
a woodpecker searches
under the shingles

the city sends its workers 
out in white trucks
to cut back and collect
ice broken branches

mud on the fenders
mud on the hubcaps
mud on the winter boots
mud on the carpet

life is busy in the underground
it reaches up, it reaches down
it makes its little tunnels
it takes what is left over
it takes what is spit out
what is buried and denied
it takes it all, it drinks the rain

feed it ashes and snow
shit and shriveled rinds
gristle and coffee grinds
feed it blood and bone, your own
seed, your own cut nails
it takes it all, it drinks it down

crows celebrate in the bare trees
sparrows fly to the river by hundreds
the snow geese will come, they will
come back to the river, to the marshes
winter rain, winter rain, winter rain

Snapshot Poem 05 February 02008

Super Tuesday

The citizenry is aroused.
The citizenry is saying No! No! No!
But that's not all.
The citizenry is saying Yes! Yes! Yes!

Smoky rooms are in disarray.
Pundits have much to say.
Conservatives are thumbing through the dictionary.
The left weighs liberal versus progressive.

Boomers wax nostalgic.
The young dance in the streets.
Thin blonds are sharpening their knives.
Soldiers stand at attention.

Men in suits hustle through doorways.
The religious fall to their knees.
The rich change the combinations on their safes.
Stockbrokers wear out the minus sign.

Around the world, people are watching.
The huddled mass holds its breath.
Bankers pace in boardrooms.
People are watching around the world.

What is happening? Who will it be?
White men check their zippers.
Women lift their children, they straighten
their shoulders. Who will it be?

 

This week's prompt was Mystery Thriller.