When
Maggie Kelley
sent this poem to me, she included this comment: "Our family is
constantly undergoing changes—its like some larger organic
form whose
configuration has shifting edges—not always easy accept the
new
shape—the only way I can seem to deal with the pain of it is
to try
and make some kind of art."
FIRST SPRING COOL
A sweet night air
from high hill wood
rolls, spills softly
down fills meadow
with first spring cool
cool breath brushing, gliding
gathering whispers
of violets
and trillium
with old brown leaves
brown leaves rotting, melting
cradle-ing essence
of purpleness
and yellowness
with first spring cool
cool breath braiding, twisting
quickening pieces
of promises
and yesterday
with first spring cool |
—Maggie Kelley, April 1997
* * * * * * *
Michael E.
Newman
Mike sent me these poems recently in an email, saying he was including
"a little blurb I
wrote for last month's theme: grace. Don't know whatever else it is
about."
I AWOKE
Yesterday I Awoke
Yesterday I awoke a fish, and craved the sea I could not see.
Today I awoke and saw the same sea
as that in which I live and move and have my being,
and I saw that it always was, and is, and evermore shall be.
I awoke to find that that which I crave and sometimes cannot see
surrounds me always and forever,
even in my blindness and insanity.
Each creature of the sea is its child,
and though it sometimes feels abandoned,
it is nurtured by that which surrounds it.
Today I Awoke
Today I awoke to mid-day work and sun,
and could see nothing that was not a gift of grace.
Tomorrow I may wake in despair, for although it still remains,
I may not see its hidden face.
If so, then I shall sit in silence, and be still until I know
That it is there in every breath and nowhere did it not go.
Until the film lifts from my eyes, and I can see again,
I shall believe in an endless and eternal sea,
a sea of grace in which I swim
—Michael E. Newman
* * * * * * *
Bronston Swindle
[I Demand the World Return to
my Mouth]
I
demand the world return to my mouth,
That this devil varnish be
stripped from things,
That objects cry out again to be
touched and tasted.
I demand a language predicated on return
from exile,
The release of tongues.
I demand a language
unbroken and immediate,
That still resides in the objects it
describes.
A language that still feels.
I demand my immediate
release.
I demand that the records of my mind be unsealed.
And that each object be spoken for by a public voice.
That
mere projections dissolve like a shroud of swamp mist at daybreak.
That each thing be reified.
The bed. The lamp. The door.
The cat. The book. The window.
Shall move out of the abandoned
corridors of dead language.
And abandon themselves once more
to the central pull,
Reel again in the inplacable dance of naked
existence.
I demand they tremble within this
fire-filled sheath of proteinate amory.
I demand that each
thing become encumbered with its age.
And I too am a thing.
No more alive, no less.
Filled with forceful voices.
Of
time, of age.
Thrown without asking among these islands of tissue
and seas of crimson salt.
I demand that the world cry out
against
its idealization and reclaim its thingness.
That
e a c h l e
t t e r b e c o m
e v i s i b l e a g a i n. .
I lay
full upon this bed.
Heavy
in every limb, the center of each nucleus
Rushing
towards the center of the
earth.
Splayed
against woven fibers of tense linen.
Every small motion shedding
a storm of cells.
Heroic husks, their structure yet
held...
I feel the tide of light rushing from the lamp, each
calorie of the burning bulb,
Falling into the white undulousness
of the comforter,
the
golden heat.
That burns the folds of its definition.
The
sepia and honey pools that lay among the folds.
I gather them
around me, around the slight damp of my stretching feet.
And rise
again into sleep.
—
Bronston Swindle
* * * * * * *
Kristal Tomshany
This poem by Kristal reflects the high plains of the Oklahoma
Panhandle where she grew up and still returns to see her family . .
. and reflects the landscape of love and the human spirit as well.
WINTER BUFFALO
GRASS
The weight of my being
is suspended between heaven and earth,
fully borne, held up impossibly by
thin, interlocking spirals of charcoal,
grey, gold and ochre. Oscillating tightly,
each curl clings to the memory of itself
in the midst of this endless, sweeping gale.
Rooted chords vibrate my depths
Currents of connection rush and hum
as I myself am nearly swept away
by the sudden beauty of your presence.
Again we find each other in this world!
Love simultaneously ascends and
descends, colliding in joy:
Yes.
Yes.
It is, after all, the expanse of your chest
that I delighted to walk upon as a child.
It is, after all, this spicy sweet grass I return to
in the pasture of your embrace.
It is, after all, full circles we navigate, and
utter grace we inhabit.
It is, after all, the exhalations of pure bliss
hissing out from every dormant blade.
—Kristal Tomshany
* * * * * * *
The following poem by Kristal tells a story of two paths:
REUNION
"This is modern manna," I wanted to say,
referring to the blue umbrella which you
had forgotten to bring to the worship service,
and which I had offered to pick up here,
in this quiet, clock-ticking living room we
had shared as childhood cousins.
"This umbrella is Jonah's whale," I wanted to say,
"spitting us out right here, into this present moment."
I sensed your unease, your awareness of how
alone we were, of how the clock spoke truth.
Miles from the safe borders of your monk's
vestments, you felt naked, standing there
before me in every-day pants and a shirt.
Frantically, the hinges of your fingers fumbled
with the umbrella's, searching for collapse,
groping for closure. The threatened animals
of your two moist hands fought wildly against
the stubborn splay of metal tips.
"This is the hair of the woman that dried Jesus feet,"
I wanted to say, "This is love that cannot be contained."
Having pity, I took the umbrella from you,
coaxing the tips slowly and gently back
into their round plastic handle. This being
done, you quickly took it from me, and began
binding the strap round and round the now
mummified cylinder, then velcroed it shut,
like Christ's tomb.
As you handed it back to me, in what
you hoped would be a last transaction,
the long, red vines of my heart emerged,
probing for an entrance to your soul.
How great was your need to stay focused
on the umbrella! How desperately you
tried to transfigure yourself into tight,
compact folds of blue nylon.
The trembling shields of your eyes confirmed the fact that
I now lived as someone who had chosen their own body and blood.
Embrace was now immanent, mandatory.
(It could be years before we saw each other again)
Your hug was perfunctory, pushing for separation
prematurely, as if my arms were pythons, and
delay spelled danger. The tendrils of my heart-vines
knew there would be no intertwining of souls today,
and, along with my arms, they retreated.
I spoke something in your language, bringing
a welcomed closure to the lost moment.
My comment about life's difficult journey
triggered a religious reflex, and out of you
came the liturgically metered response:
"We are all in darkness until Christ comes again."
These armoured words rode forth like crusaders, their bright,
resolute flags distracting our view of the present moment.
It became clear---your utter need for faith
beyond feeling, and my utter incapability of it.
What was this distant smoke-pillar of hope
by which you had so dutifully and carefully
mapped out the course of your life? Un-ownable,
it seemed the only thing you owned.
Comprehension gave way to compassion as I realized:
these words of promise could be your only gift to me.
Back in the car, I tossed the umbrella into
the passenger seat, thinking: The next time
I use this umbrella . . . the next time I loosen
its grave clothes to witness the expansive
stretch of resurrection's unfolding,
I will think of you, dear cousin.
And, in some wet instant of gale-force,
I will resist the impulse to tighten my grip
on the blue plastic handle. Instead, I will
let go, allowing the umbrella it's short-lived
moment of clumsy ascension. Rain will
run down my forehead in cool rivulets.
"This is baptism," I will say out loud, "This is salvation."
And this act of love can be my only gift to you.
—Kristal Tomshany
* * * * * * *
Bill Turley
Bill
says this poem is about
the muse. Indeed it is, and much more . . .
LETTER TO THE MUSE
After traveling this far from home, I ask,
Do you treat all exiles the same?
I strain so much to make you understand,
That I lose myself before first paragraphs.
In my landscapes, I confess, I was reaching for a silence.
I never knew this until I began to trust your wisdom.
I am not on an equal basis with you,
The voice we parented is still a stranger.
In hindsight, taking cues from old photographs
I lost our beginnings.
You lead me so close to the heart of things
Where the light is blinding,
And I realize I am being led
Regardless of my principles.
Many of these writings are born
trying to steal a dream from half-sleep.
Some remain in this room
Where I would like to sleep,
But there is always some beginning
Which lingers even when lines are spinning home.
—Bill Turley
* * * * * * *
Bill said the poem below was
written upon the occasion of
reading recent discoveries about the life of Jesus and potential
archeological records of him and his family. It is as yet untitled, so
I put a temporary title on it.
THEY SAY . . .
They say you had a family
At least a brother, maybe a sister.
Baptized by John in waters that called to the
Breath in you, making your back lean strong against
The Roman law of the land,
And still you refuse to be the adversary
Offering them your sinuous branch.
Covering your wounds wrapped in cloth of your knowing,
Taking the arrow from the stifling wind, bending it,
Fashioning it to a new covenant.
And Mary, who could doubt her countenance:
By far the strongest of the twelve.
She held the broken dove in her hand
When the blanket of their grief muffled
The sound of their horizon, when there was nothing left
But to take the yoke of your body into the streets to every heart.
—Bill Turley
* * * * * * *
Ann Zoller
This poem and the following poem
("What Speaks")
explore
the
experience
of love and matters of the spirit.
SO SIMPLE
My
primal need is to
love and be loved,
to be kissed under the moon
and
to let its light fill the room
while I feed berries to my lover.
I want to hear music while we
feed
our bodies.
I want to walk in light all night
as we sleep in a spoon of dream,
as
our spirits sip from a cup
of desire. So simple -
to let the spirit slide into this cloud
of
blue music, this halo of energy
from god who loves us
and speaks from the heart
inside
our soul, the soul
inside the universe,
inside the eyes of every lover.
—Ann
Zoller
* * * * * *
*
WHAT SPEAKS
The seed grew into a star
and the boat took them
into the cavity
where light shattered
their eyes.
Once two trees leaned close
to earth, their roots tight,
uncertain
until the dress on the moon
split open and the train
circled the sky.
Out of the chest a bird
glided by to lead
the way home.
Only when we travel outside
trees soaked with leaves
do we ride the spirit and enter
the water.
—
Ann
Zoller
* * * * * *
*
The following poem was previously published in
Nimrod International Journal,
Vol. 30,
Number 1, Fall/Winter 1986, and is
reprinted here with their permission.
THE VISION OF RAIN
My other self is a thin statue
I call Jenny. She hovers
when my eyes squint before a storm,
her wings invisible, rattle silence
as she flies ahead of me,
coaxing with her black hair streaming
in the night wind.
Jenny is my inside part gone out
into the world, she gave
directions when I spied
on men castrating pigs with pocket knives.
Pigs screamed behind the shed
and farmers laughed too loud.
Jenny took my hand as I blessed
the bleeding pigs,
as I offered garlands of violets
to their foamy mouths. Within the eyes
of pigs I learned the pain of survival.
Jenny is the other, my name
of grace who lives inside the black moon
and wears owl robes when the pond
shines with ghastly light.
I ask her what’s in store
as though she will tell me
how the red squirrel remembers
acorns hidden from other winters.
She tells me to study the river,
feel the drop of rain before it falls,
she tells me I will be ready
when the apparitions sing lines
of the poem and bring me fish.
Under the weight of blankets
when fever gives me a second body
I enter an envelope above the bed,
a place where candles ignite
and wings thrum as harps.
There is no time there,
only softness like a fuzzy comet
that pauses in its journey
beyond this room.
Jenny is the self that moves
between the worlds, a being
that does not speak,
her sound quiet as green
inside the bud that hasn’t formed.
—Ann
Zoller
* * * * * *
*
The following
poem was also
previously published in
Nimrod
International Journal,
in Vol.
38, No.1,
Fall/Winter 1995,
and is
reprinted here with their permission.
RETURNING TO THE SEA
If you know what happened to the shoes
beside the barn, would you tell the woman
shrouded in sealskin? She went to the water’s edge,
sprawled in the wave and did not tell anyone
about eating blood sausage, the smell
of fried blood so sweet it hung like a prayer
outside the door, an odor that sneaked
in windows when all there was was gauze
and a faint shape like a child’s thin body
washed in the moon. To survive
is not enough, to make it through the long
field where corn waved like maniacs
in green with straw hair. Oh no, one needs
to heal, sew the heart together and paint
a pretty face over the picture smeared with crayons
and charcoal. Perhaps the milk from the lonely
cows will not sour now and mother’s trick
of clabbering the cream high on a shelf
in the cupboard will work like magic?
And after healing scars and selling
all the family plates, will she finally
thrive, swim out to sea and wear a fine
new dress, made of silk with a madras design?
Did the soul take on a seal’s coat,
the slick skin falling through the sea
on a circular journey,
and did the boat come home,
sliding through the water of the night?
—Ann Zoller
* * * * * * *