WATERMARK

a poet’s notebook

Established 02004

  • snapshot poem 01 july 02026

    i slept through strawberry moon 

    the roses have let go 

    the garden is buried in petals 

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  • Bonbon

    Large black & white cat, on his back, looking curious
    Bobon, the monster cat.

    He and his brother were little sweet kittens. This one grew into a big-hearted, clumsy, demanding monster. Affectionate, yes. Demonstrates it by slamming his huge body into my old soft one. Generous, yes. Will bring me toys, usually not-meant-to-be toys, to share with me in a game of fetch. Cheerful, yes. Leaps onto my unwell sleeping body in an ecstasy of greeting.

    He is not beautiful. Aren’t all cats beautiful? Not this one. He has a funny face. Big flat nose. Eyes that always seem to need cleaning. Giant paws with rarely retracted claws. He has a lot to say.

    Also, he is a total innocent.

    Bonbon.

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  • Three a.m. perseveration & a poem at the end of the world

    Someday, historians and archaeologists will collect data, develop theories, try to understand how it was that we could know what we were doing — to our planet, to each other — and go on doing it. Our best hope now is that those scholars and scientists might be human. 

    Because they might not. 

    They will ask what happened, and how. How could knowledgeable, educated people destroy themselves like this? Why did they continue in practices that their own studies showed were certain to destroy what they needed to survive? 

    Such intelligent, sophisticated beings. They (we) had great cities, universities, art and music, mathematics, technology. Democracy. And they gave it all away. 

    Living in it, now, I have thought these thoughts myself, as one of those lost citizens. I see that we have gone crazy. I see us blame each other and escalate the destruction.
    (more…)
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  • Summer Solstice

    Poem (text below) with summer elements in pind, green, orange, pale blue, lavender. Flowers, berries, a woman's face.
    Summer Solstice. Digital Collage by sb. Full credits at flickr.

    Summer Solstice, Sitka, 1993

    This day blooms
    under wide meadows
    of sky. We lay
    our sun-stunned bodies
    in constellations
    of clover and buttercups.

    Salmonberry bubbles
    of sweet red light
    break on our tongues.
    Shooting stars
    in the flowerbeds,
    pollen in our sheets.

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  • Gender: Tradition!

    Human figures on a chaotic background of blue, red, yellow, green, etc.
    ALICE in the 02020’s. Digital collage by sb. Full credits at flickr.

    Opponents insist that same-sex marriage is a threat to “traditional” marriage. They are right. 

    But the threat isn’t about marriage. It’s about gender and its strict rules. It’s about girl/boy. It’s about man/woman. It’s about husband/wife. It is about, if they can bend the rules . . . 

    When a man and woman marry, he is not required to be husband and she is not required to be wife?

    This is scary. This is a bit too much freedom of choice. This is, what do you mean we can make our own rules? This is, how do I know what to do? How do I know who to be?

    That ground is too shaky. It could open up and swallow us. Let’s go back to solid ground. Let’s go back to where I know what to do, where I know who to be. 

    Let’s stop changing things.

    We had just begun to accept that men could love men and women could love women, but now you want us to accept that man and woman are flexible things? 

    This is a world too far. 

    Next you will insist that there are more than two genders. 

    This is the fourth in a series about gender. The others are:

    Gender: Ambiguity
    Gender: Anatomical?
    Gender: Drag

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LINKS:

Poetry Blog Digest @ Via Negativa