Snapshots, December 1 2005
i. m. Paschke
i
denti
fiables
give way to
blank
faces silhouettes
afterimages
have burned through one
scrim
revealing an
other
Gerald Schwartz
***
an odd night of it
even thinking
awake or asleep
of the poem i would write
how it would somehow
collate the public & the private
the man who died
the man who spoke
the same old lies
some truths about our past
sure i had worked out
some fine lines
until i woke
crossed that threshold
lost what i remember
as solid in my
mind less
what i think
i never had a hold on
i watched both last night
the man in bow tie aging
so fast before my eyes
as he told his country
mine harsh happy truths
that other told us too
what he thought of us
& his own so solid faith
in self unswayed
my dream or
was it inscribed
a possibility now gone
like that man we
always knew
grown old & cranky
funny still, &
true
(for Pierre Berton)
Wednesday December 1 2004
Douglas Barbour
***
Thinking Out Loud
Only once he has begun and
it's too late to stop the motion,
the new dimension strikes:
autobiography is not the singular,
it is family history,
and all are present,
real or spirit.
"It's not about you."
Children (two
characters who've found
their author)
hear their father rehearse
his dive into Purgatory,
things they saw or perhaps
did not see,
the climb outward
they saw or perhaps
did not see.
Reality hits at the worst moment,
brings a great No Kidding
revelation to
the artiste hereafter known
as Obviousman:
that tenses define us,
that this was his wife
but is still their mother,
that each has his own story
of the miracle of survival.
Kenneth Wolman
***
morning walk --
grey sky
blue heron
Sharon Brogan
***
I Arrange My Hair
Lately, I've been
more relaxed than
I probably should be
I don't seem to mind
cellophane
conversations
as much
as I did before
I even manage
a smile, though your
compliments evaporate
steam-like in the air
But, just before your
eyes fell
on my slim
volume
I heard myself, giggle?
I arrange my hair
and will admit
the most embarrassing
moment (what
caused me to blush)
is not the way you
lean forward
to touch my chair
but how suddenly
I tighten my stomach
before standing
to shake your hand
Deborah Russell - 8:21pm - 01-12-04
Baltimore, Maryland
***
TODAY
Today
I have measured
the walls of our rooms
and our hallway.
Today
I have measured
the piles of books
that stand on our floors.
Tomorrow
I will measure
new bookcases to
go on the walls
to hold the books
that stand in piles
on our floors.
Soon
we will have
enough bookcases
to hold the books
that stand in piles
on our floors.
Again!
Roger Collett
6:30pm Darlington
***
Snap
Emily's keyhole.
The doctor's visit.
His eye through the keyhole.
Emily walks back and forth.
Mark walking in one direction.
Rebecca walking in the other.
The sun flush on the Oak's yellow wintergreen
The leaves slightly fluttering through the glass
I in front of the monitor
Windows upon windows.
Stephen Vincent
***
Raining
Raining. There is silence since rain's self
Makes no noise unless a noise of peace.
Raining. The sky's gone to sleep. When the soul is
Widowed of unknowing, feeling gropes.
Raining. My essence (who I am) I repeal.
So calm the rain is, it seems to disappear
(Not even made of clouds) into air, seems
Not to be rain even, only a whisper
Which itself, in the whispering, dislimns.
Raining. Nothing gleams.
No wind is hovering. There is no sky
That I can feel. It's raining, distinct, indistinct,
Like something certain which may be a lie,
Like what a lie does to us, some great thing desired.
Raining. In me nothing's stirred.
(2.10.33)
--Fernando Pessoa (under his own name)
tr. Jonathan Griffin
in *Fernando Pessoa: Selected Poems*
[Middlesex, England: Penguin Books, 1974]
Halvard Johnson
***
Today started at Trigg's Island
having coffee by the sea. A welcome break
from one too many deaths, a love
that can't become. We walked the sands
and climbed the rocks, my white
bare feet feeling every serrated edge,
massaging back-up through the body
that remembered being sixteen
and climbing this reef after
singing "Sloop John B" or somesuch
to a slavish guitar by bonfire-light
beneath the moon.
Today
she brought red rose petals
for us to throw onto the waves,
a farewell and welcome for
our souls and the dearly departed.
I told a distinctly Catholic joke,
then a Marxist one to balance
the ledger. Her mobile rang
and a child needed his Mum.
We put our shoes back on,
my holey socks, and kissed.
Life distracts us from death.
I hit the road and went to
the Monastery for sustenance,
prayed another rosary of sorts
and crapped in the monk's crapper.
Two Asian cooks without English
prepared lunch. Outside
in the sun of the first day of summer
I taught two youngsters how to sms,
then drove home smugly,
messaging them at the lights.
Life, death - we are often on amber.
Andrew Burke
***
TARTUFFE [INSIDE TARTUFFE]
[via F.W. Murnau]
The number of hypocrites in each.
Attends to my household.
"Ring to your heart’s content!"
"Touring Cinema" [invited inside, projects double, & exposes.]
Barry Alpert / Silver Spring, MD US / 12-1-04 (9:01 AM)
***
on a good day
it takes 45 minutes to go from 07104 to 07105, one way, same city
it takes several turns round the block to find the place
to leave the car, where it will be safe, where it won’t be hemmed in
sideswiped or starling-splattered
it takes a certain sequence of steps to gain
entrance. two sets of keys, a one lb shiny padlock to pull back
a chain link fence scrapping against asphalt, another stiff, rust-pocked
padlock to signal the release of the accordion-style, sardine can
roll-down gates. it takes a walk in the dark, tripping up the stairs
following the detritus of the aftercare children’s toys left like crumbs
forward, toward the fuse box, feeling the sound of clicks in the right
order
to illuminate. . . that would be a good day and even still
it takes an act of will
to rise
this is a day
with rain that makes it still feel like the muddle of night
there is the promise/prediction of high winds and danger
when the rains stop. there is the inevitable
flooding through Harrison and along Pulaski
the search for alternate routes, reasons
to stay on higher ground, work from home
that could be a better day
Deborah Humphreys
Newark, NJ
8:05 and still in my night clothes
***
part of the white sky has that insect sound
but something has blown past here
as cicadas wall up their whispers
everything may not have been alright
the anxious level drone
the body too hot for its music
walls cluster round branded air
it might be safe but is it good for you
spoonful after spoonful
heart's bass just detectable in the rib
and throat bends away
fall on me dark
you are leaves and bruises
rather than bureaucratic ironies
not everything is steady
dropping 20 degrees on the minute
it's a war let's face it
see it jumping on your skin
and your lungs, god, they could do more
don't hold me, don't chase me away
taste is useless without rasp and muscle
lightening over the field
rain in the mouth and wave on wave
hand pushing the line
Jill Jones
1 December 2004, Sydney
***
ANGELLED
when he the
crabbed atheist
saw outside
his office window
an angel fly past
even behaloed
and well preened
he was certainly
rather surprised
even disturbed
but then twigged
that it was Fred
the window cleaner
just winding him up.
pmcmanus 10-50
raynesparklondon uk
***
Our Bat Plague
Soon after dark, the invaders:
a loud crack against glass
somewhere at the back of the house,
then ŒGo away, you horrible things!¹
my wife¹s welcome to the fruit-bats,
come to our tall citriodora
for the nectar in the gum-flowers.
They shriek and flap about and break off
twiglets, twigs, branchlets, branches.
Their coven is by the river where
the Wildlife folk hope to make them
a tourist attraction ŒMelbourne¹s penguins¹.
Whence they sally forth at dusk to check
fig trees, anything in fruit, now our gum.
She¹s out there now with a tambourine
and a pair of rattly maracas
(which just happen to be handy)
jangling at the foot of the tree,
where I wouldn¹t dream of standing.
I¹m at the back door crashing
smartly together two big gardening books.
None of which sends them packing.
My wife spends what she calls a sleepless night
listening to the flapping and shrieking.
Yet in the morning they¹re gone.
The twigs and leaf-litter furnish kindling
for the fireplace in the evening.
Next night, the plague¹s renewed. On the phone
Neil Next-Door says borrow his long pole
with a speaker at the end linked
to a player transmitting the anti-bat
music they used to clear the Royal Botanics.
(How does it sound to human ears? more
shrieking? we didn¹t think to ask.)
My son in New South Wales says his friend
the mango-grower has a licence to shoot,
but really netting is the only way.
Not that you could net our lemon-scented gum.
Third night, pretty quiet. Harvest done?
We seem to have our garden back. They¹re gone.
Wednesday 1 December, 2004
Max Richards at Cooee
North Balwyn, Melbourne
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