River

today at the River

Dream Truck

so much to think about tonight

Chee

I am growing in my ability to put together photos and play on the computer- this begs for your feedback.

Guess what this is~

First snow 2007

been feeling moody

what do you think of this image?

photo

Tina and Bethany we are still looking for you

This is a poem after six years of searching for the bodies of Tina and Bethany Sinclair. Mother and daughter disappeared one night after a fight with the mother's boyfriend. Recently the boyfriend had been released from prison. He had been convicted for molestation of his daughter. These days he restlessly rides our roads again.
I have participated in searches for the last six years. The family would like to have closure.
We gathered this morning under a rain drenched gray tarp and ate donuts and pizza...waiting for something to unfold, maybe a miracle.

I rose at dawn
from red wrinkled sheets
unfolding my thoughts
from dreams
of cold streams


morning mountain search
heart sick from wondering
how to find
of their bodies


tobacco silky snake
slithered into my nostrils
chatter of eyebrow prices
hair highlighting accent
we waited

mourning mountain search
heart struck from wandering
looking for pieces
of their bodies

pandemonium over the perpetrator
riding his truck
too close to their memorial
an inward scream escapes
psychically thrashing

mourning mama sinks
her teeth into donuts
looking for places
to rest from their deaths

windy day
weeping seeping water
trees scratch the sky
till it’s bloodless
my eyes search the grass
a bit of bone or hair

mountain moving mama
sweet Tina
give us a tell, a hint
six years and still looking

mummy oh mummy

why pretend
to love me

I still hate you
wish it could change

ghosts scurry past
my angry energy

why pretend
to love you

yes you were sick
I know that so well

but why do I need
to excuse

you were so cruel
touch, word, look

I withered
power was yours

now you are dead
power is mine

wish I could be kind
to your memory

Elephant alas

1.
a strange tale I tell to thee
pray you pull up a chair and see
how in ancient times a fable came to pass
wild story of an elephant and a lass
marriage of man and beast
please come and join in the feast


2.
How did the elephant-god grow inside this one?
many noble men came and had their fun,
leaving slippery seeds tucked deep inside
to celebrate their human bride
but elephants in blue and gray
came stealthily into the fray


3.
elephants all night and day
with noses long that sure did sway
a quilt of wrinkled skin and toes
a path of peanut shells, god knows
elephants did duck and dart
while dancing into her heart


4.
when her babe was due be born
at four a.m. she was shorn
prayed Ganesh a solemn vow
help me to embrace this creature now
huge crowds gathered outside to see
the dazzling birth, at once, of thee


5.
dawn bled a crimson light
causing everyone a terrible fright
drunken men that had appeared quite tame
were wild and then became inhumane
elephants in blue and tan
were lurking close at hand



6.
bellowed through his long pink nose
burst her bedroom door with that hose
the crowd swelled and a few did jeer
many still toasting with a beer
elephants quite bold did dare
gallop upon the peopled square



7.
a hush descended over the air
baby rose from his birth chair
man and beast stood eye to ear
then came the stink of human fear
elephants in blue and red
where weeping tears of dread




8.
all were kneeling with their heads bowed low
two a breast in a neat long row
baby’s pink trunk wrapped round his mother’s waist
he suckled with a lusty haste
the evening star was drawing near
bawdy songs broke out for more beer


9.
my tale of course has a darker side
humans trampled when they tried to ride
the pink elephants that did appear
when finally consumed was all the beer
mourning elephants in black and gray
filed out of town in terribly quiet way

10.
by noon the troops had rallied
guns and bombs and fear were tallied
through the town the church bells rang
songs of beer no longer sang
“I knew they’d kill us!” they did chant
mother’s ears burned to hear such a rant

11.
drums began to beat
the sun turned up the heat
a thousand names elephants did call
“gods save us from this demonic fall
we had gathered to celebrate
human body with elephant pate”

12.
Elephants in meditations woke
as gods laughter loudly broke
thoughts of war all fell away
“We have lost the heart to kill today!”
elephants in yellow and white
led a parade of humane delight

13.
upon a lotus of mothers milk
songs of peace where the ilk
Ganesh’s father Shiva did appear
everyone ordered some near beer
Elephants adorned with flowers bright
ridden by humans all through the night

dreaming water: living air

~~~~
In the reflection I am well
sickness has no foothold
beneath water's skin of mirror
I am breathing with great ease
~~~~



~~~~
we paddled
over the icy skin
of river's dream,
you dying
me sick
from love
~~~~

mountain river me

August reflections

I lift myself to the sun
great fire overhead
I am lifting myself

my surface eats
rays laid on me
I am lifting higher

stretching over the water
I am reaching to you
my sol

One-Hundred Word Story

~Once upon a time there lived a man who had two wolves chained to a tree. A girl and her baby came to visit the man. As she turned to hug the man she lowered the child to the ground. Being a curious lad he crawled to the wolves. The wolves thinking they had just been given a gift, picked him up and trotted behind the tree.

As I listened to this story I was so shocked about the baby's fate that I forgot the rest of the story. So forever after the child is in the wolves grinning mouths.~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

the night the wolf appeared
first as a musty smell
he roamed wearily
in my dim dreams
he inhabited my waking
by first light
his second tell
tracks in the mud
scat boldly deposited

following nights
I laid awake waiting
for the breath of noise
an unseen movement
the crack of a twig

I lost a week
then fainted
flashes of blue black shine
long canines
garnet red eye
I'm dream walking
spray can in hand
like automatic writing
I released him onto the
red clay brick wall

*******
danced around black fir
my feet flew faster
than you could run

sleek body blur
a red eye
lingered

I dreamed of you
nightly
rapacious spirit

Paint Orange and Blue

Blue Rust

Brattleboro, Vermont

Robyn with Lily scarf August 24, 2007

blossoms on the road

Lightning strikes tower of babel

This poem was ignited by a lightning strike I watched hit a church three blocks from my living-room window on Friday night during the art walk. This weather event prompted a walkabout, and my lovely stroll was filled with bohemian life eye candy. What a fabulous town!


Lightning strikes tower of babel


electrified
Giacometti stick men
walked into our town
friday night,
a skinny white leg
stood-
upon the church steeple’s
granite cross,
a modern day
Ziggurat;
soldiers of fire kept watch
and bid us townspeople
wait;
do we storm heaven
waving our swords at
god?
or shall we accept that
Zeus
has walked among us
and
party on?

Lightning

Lightning is fascinating in these photos:

http://www.lightningphotography.com/favourites.html

Information about different types of lightning:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightning

how to survive lightning strikes

http://www.discoverychannel.com.au/survival_zone/worst_case/lightning/index.shtml

want to read a true story while waiting to use the land line or plumbing-

Gretel Ehrlich was born on a horse ranch near Santa Barbara, California and was educated at Bennington College and UCLA film school. She worked in film for ten years, then began writing fulltime in 1978 after the death of a loved one.

1991 was the year Ehrlich was hit by lightning while taking a walk on her ranch. She was hospitalized and severly debilitated for several years. She writes of the experience in her nationally bestselling memoir, A MATCH TO THE HEART, published by Pantheon in 1994.

or fiction:

A solitary New Jersey librarian whose favorite book is a guide to suicide methods is struck by lightning in Alice Hoffman's superb novel, The Ice Queen. Orphaned at the age of eight after angrily wishing she would never see her mother again, our heroine found herself frozen emotionally: "I was the child who stomped her feet and made a single wish and in so doing ended the whole world‹my world, at any rate." Her brother Ned solved the pain of their mother's death by becoming a meteorologist: applying reason and logic to bad weather. Eventually, he invites our heroine to move down to Florida, where he teaches at a university. Here, while trying to swat a fly, she is struck by lightning (the resulting neurological damage includes an inability to see the color red). Orlon County turns out to receive two thirds of all the lightning strikes in Florida each year, and our heroine soon becomes drawn into the mysteries of lightning: the withering of trees and landscape near a strike, the medical traumas and odd new abilities of victims, the myths of renewal. Although a recluse, she becomes fascinated by a legendary local farmer nicknamed Lazarus Jones, said to have beaten death after a lightning strike: to have seen the other side and come back. The burning match to her cool reserve--her personal unguided tour through Hades--Lazarus will prove to be the talisman that restores her to girlhood innocence and possibility.

2007 Illumination

poems being critiqued on another site

1.
Ode to LI

Anne, fair of face and
full of grace, did try to do
herself in that day

fates that bind our souls
to earth with needle and gold
thread, did mend her wings

lithium: tiny silvery
element-tarnishes in
a minute, fresh cut

the grey gift,
better than a battery
25 years and still running

2.
Rain On Me

Rain and brother consequence
how many words do we have for rain?
I am wordless in the midst of fat drops
that splat onto asphalt and as if-
I have opened a book and slapped it shut-
the drops grow hands and clap.

oh fuck what does it matter-
life comes and goes
we have no control
The void of one exquisite human being-
an essence of life, vitality, personality.
I miss you
miss you.
are we in the Bardo?
way too painful to be heaven-
a heaven of excruciating pain, maybe
my hands clap and thunder rolls

how many words for tears-

3.
The Dance


lively music lured me
off the street the night we did meet;
amid a sumptuous spread of food
each dude and lady fair
began a lively dance,
great lines formed right and left

some thin- others with heft
whisky ran through our veins
fiddlers rubbed their strings raw
a path parted then I saw,
he stepped from the crowd;
wild straw hair, his chest was bare

he flung himself onto the floor
my heart was captured by the wild boar
a dance we did I must confess
so low and base I ripped my dress,
to hades we had fled,
tears where shed as we lay dead

4.
My Nature Abused

A broken branch
I grew
like a river split
in two

I reach back
hold that child,
shield that baby,
heal my baby-girl
who is me

One river
one tree
a woman grown

5.
Memory


a gentle wave of starlight
licking on the beach
of earth's skin
night shine
electric blue iris
glowing, growing
warning of a danger
ghostlike tendrils stretch
over new night skies
this earth too hot
her skin chillingly cold

6.
she wandered the beach
gumbo earth took her foot with a screech
she fell to earth and lifetimes unfurled
memories of when she breathed for the world
laying under thin plastic
awaiting the fantastic
words like gum balls fell
candy for the insane death knell





Haiku

1.
'til starlight flickers
over your shoulder, I watch
sand shifting gently

2.
diluting my tears
ice-caps of heart are melting
my personal warming

3.
like dreams of our youth
I could balance on my head
till I went to bed

like dreams of our youth
I was so witty and gay
which got in my way

like dreams of our youth
wondering just who I might be
wrinkles sprinkled free

like dreams of our youth
reality slowed me down
smile now a frown

like dreams of our youth
nightmare of my death's release
when daydreams will cease

4.
one eye on the sky
head cocked ready to retract
falling stars glitter

one eye on the sky
mountains burn embers glow bright
animals panting

one eye on the sky
lightening strobes under gray clouds
we run hand in hand

one eye on the sky
your belly on mine, we dance
shall we name baby?

Cinquain:

of bitter-sweet grapes
skin, my neatly clipped nails peel
kneel- breathlessly close
your radiant lips
open, delicious

Snapshots:

1.
a chill wind whips my right eye
I watch intently as an eagle pulls at red flesh
he's standing on thin ice
dropping a bone he hops
rubbing his long yellow face
over ruffled ice
bothered ice
rumpled ice
he sips pooled water

a thirsty wind
steals my tears
and leaves them frozen
falling in small sparkling crystals

geese bark hiss walk
over the home-comb of ice
past the eagle
his white head turned
a pale yellow eye watching

2.
I laid back
breathlessly waiting
to see the helicopters

yet the billowing smoke rose
opening with the sun
honey bees had fled

I laid back
panting for air
black fingers in my lungs

I watched the mountain burn,
dry hot wind blew
as animals ran

when night shut the sky
red embers burned hot
below the horizon

"I am from":

1.
I am from naught
and unto naught I do become
yet, I linger longer than I should
in the naughty of naught

2.
I am from anger
I burn a dusky red
your voice bristles my fur
your scent burns in my nose
quiet, I am subduing my fury
really what good would it do
this internal burn and waste of energy
you will always work against me, why I don't know
I resent your presence in my life, you great destroyer
I am forever creatively working around you, my rock.

resonses to my crit:

1.
Her work does of the best things any poetry can do: it invites response. There is great honesty and openness in her work, and in her consistent play in the process of poetic thought, and in its community. By her example, I've come to a deeper personal appreciation of that play and process and community.

2.
She is one of my favorite poet's here, and a bit mysterious. I am looking forward to this BOW crit, probably this weekend when I have the proper amount of time to devote to it.
3.
I adore her way with words. It is as un-self-conscious, as free, as unique as anyone I've ever read. Her poems, without fail, feel as though they've been written to me, for me. She has a wondrous vocabulary, but she can use plain words to elegant effect just as well. And she knows just when slang or nonsense words will do the trick.

It's especially in her Snapshot poems that I find a spontaneous magic. It seems wrong even to suggest bridling her words with form.

Often, when I read her haiku, I think, she's already there -- where we're all trying to go.

She's capable of being topical, angry, tortured, blissful, horny, melancholy, forgetful, silly... anything. You can always tell it's her poem by its style, but you can't put her in a box, thematically.

Another thing I admire about her work is that it continues, regardless of the mortal storms many of us stir and endure here in the Poetry Forum. I find that humbling.

It's also interesting to me that, while most of her work here is untitled, and somewhat anonymous, it's unafraid and free. She reminds me that 'unafraid' need not be synonymous with 'aggressive' or 'ostentatious'. It just is. For example, this Snapshot poem:


heat blistering my neck
I stroll off the dance floor
my hair floating on hot sax tones

red glinting off long brown tresses
my breast bob
I wish they'd quit it

My butt is flirting the bar
I am being celibate
no one's taking me

seriously


*It's sultry, funny, annoyed, funny, and, finally, it dissolves into gentle pathos... only to slip the carpet out from under our feet at the end. In ten quiet lines.

Finally, her poems encourage me. During times when I think I've got little left to say, I read what she finds in small moments, or the unusual topics she finds, and I realise that, yes, there's more to write.

I'm a very big fan -- clearly.

awaiting call to continue life

awaiting call to continue life

life winged softly
hollow boned
breath
&
blood
quickened

fear gripped
her body
tightening
jaw
&
neck

death's
secrets
long ago
sealed
within familial
code

anxiety danced
her
to the phone
she exhaled,
then
received the doctor's call

Walk 'round the moon

walk ‘round the moon

skipping
jumping
I stumbled,
moon dust
rose
an unfolding flower,
green cheese
I swear it,
no more
walking
on the
moon
or
wish I'd brought
crackers

good day sunshine

rolling out of bed
ambling into coffee
combing out my dreams
bending my thoughts

goldfinch graze thistle
jaunty black cap
tipped onto round eyes
orange beak and feet
mustard yellow suit
charcoal wings
white bars

he opens beak hissing
paler bird hisses
mouths touching
seeds fly falling

whispers of promise
piano riff rolls
melody becomes mood

a new day
feels bright
alive
easy

Ole Man Winter's last gasp 2007

Town plows were going all night- I had restless sleep. Woke up at dawn to about 20" of bluish lavender snow being topped off with an icing of sleet. We've got a howling wind with screeching plows peppered by percussive beeping. It's the last big dance for ole man winter, maybe. Spring is excitedly waiting in the wings. The tangle of seasons have caught the birds with their feathered pants down. End of the winter hunger makes them scurry to my feeder.
All is quiet for a moment and the sky is brightening with a promise of later day sun.

Plum Island sojourn

we loved a lot,
fought a little
made up

walked tons
looked at birds
so much my eyes hurt

sat on a boardwalk
at the beach
in front of the weather channel

we ate noodles, fish, rice
we even ate turkey
birds inside & out
washed down with coffee, tea and wine


we talked
birds
birds
birds

I was so excited
had to walk away
take a break
draw a picture
look at my cuticles

we're home and lonesome
town's traffic replaced ocean waves
up at the crack-of-dawn
searching for passerines

Shimmer

I love him
I love him
let us spin together
we circle round
I see your rough edges
cutting my feelings raw
I love you
I love you
now that I've found love
I am told to set it free
why must you be so beautiful
at the threshold of death

Dante, the divine comedy spent

"Hey, I look pretty good"
he turned away
and in his wake I asked
she whispered, "he has cancer"
I rounded the corner
there he stood perusing the olive oils
"She told me," I said.
He cocked his head.
the story rolled off his tongue
rare cancer...
we are in a pocket of rare cancers
"I've got death perched on my shoulder...
I used to do yoga, now I live it!"
I know grief roiled over my face
he lost a moment to great sadness
we stood there, two souls, pondering our
transitory passage on this planet
I snuck into the office and cried
my tears hurt my eyes

how sweet is the beaver

trudged through knee deep snow, opened my portable chair on the edge of a partially ice covered Connecticut river. Binoculars pressed to my eyes I saw what looked like a dog swimming at the river bank. Not a dog, but a big healthy beaver passed and was chewing on a downed tree. He's a shy guy so as soon as I gasped he ducked under the water leaving a bubble trail to watch. Each breath broke the surface with a tiny ripple. I watched the blue sky in a smokey reflection punctuated by beaver's exhale.
the air was crisp, the mood upbeat but somber, the snow giving and deep, the silence broken by bubbles bursting and all of this made me feel so happy.

Rain on me...

Rain and brother consequence



how many words do we have for rain?
I am wordless in the midst of fat drops
that splat onto asphalt and as if-
I have opened a book and slapped it shut-
the drops grow hands and clap.

oh fuck what does it matter-
life comes and goes
we have no control
The void of one exquisite human being-
an essence of life, vitality, personality.
I miss you
miss you.
are we in the Bardo?
way too raw to be heaven-
a heaven of excruciating pain, maybe
my hands clap and thunder rolls

how many words for tears-

Ode to Steve
Robyn

~ Hand~

fingers

index is kind of a leader
saturn is pondering index
ring is in-love permanently
baby, well, will always be baby

thumb can be self centered

index and thumb connect
forming a grid of energy
ego & Jupiter
OMmmmmmmm

Valentines Day

Valentines Day

my daddy adored
mama, his heart died the day
she rejected him
_________________

her hair a red blaze
he was in a daze, listen!
then she said, "I do"
_________________

mama's favorite was
herself, daddy never did
measure up-what's love?
_________________

cut out a photo
of home-pasted on doily
baby loves mama
_________________

Lock her up, lock her
heart shaped red jello, kiss a
fellow: she chain-smoked
_________________

red smoke hung over
my pastel, rubbed the paper
didn't skip a beat