september 2010 poems
AT THE CRICK by robert james russell
It’s July and we’re at
the crick behind the middle school
near where you grew up,
the water dark and glassy, the sky overcast.
We’re standing on a sloped hill thick
with junegrass and big bluestem and you’re
talking about the crayfish you caught here
as a girl, your first kiss in the culvert
that runs under Poinsettia Avenue, the echoes
of your giggles as he touched your chest.
You’re a woman now but your hair is still
very much the same, you keep telling me,
and you’ve brought me here to
remember the things you haven’t
thought about in years. You say I remind
you of happier times, but you’re not sure why.
It’s July and we’re at
the crick behind the middle school
near where you grew up,
the water dark and glassy, the sky overcast.
We’re standing on a sloped hill thick
with junegrass and big bluestem and you’re
talking about the crayfish you caught here
as a girl, your first kiss in the culvert
that runs under Poinsettia Avenue, the echoes
of your giggles as he touched your chest.
You’re a woman now but your hair is still
very much the same, you keep telling me,
and you’ve brought me here to
remember the things you haven’t
thought about in years. You say I remind
you of happier times, but you’re not sure why.
SEA DREAM by mitchell waldman
In a dream I have
she is standing,
her smile a beacon that cuts through the darkness
that leads me,
brings me,
to the safety of her shores.
And as I tie my line,
and jump onto the dock,
after being tossed in storms for ninety-nine and one half years,
she stands there, waiting,
undeterred by my scattered look,
my wild appearance,
her eyes deep wells of sturdy love
that I gladly dive into,
her smile the sunlight warming me,
melting off the ice in my beard,
her arms, the arms that warm,
that gather me in
from all my stormy nightmares,
her lips the balm of timeless love,
that soothes this battered,
sea weary soul,
brings me back to life,
the touch of her hand so gently on my face,
as she stares silently and deeply into my eyes,
the gift of the gods and heaven and time.
A jolt jars me,
awakens me,
and I sit up in bed,
as the tossing of the vessel continues,
cruel waves still crashing against the side of the boat,
skies still stormy and gray
outside my cabin window,
and I pull myself up
the memory of her sweet dream
keeping me warm,
keeping me going,
as I search the horizon
for the sight,
any sight
of land.
In a dream I have
she is standing,
her smile a beacon that cuts through the darkness
that leads me,
brings me,
to the safety of her shores.
And as I tie my line,
and jump onto the dock,
after being tossed in storms for ninety-nine and one half years,
she stands there, waiting,
undeterred by my scattered look,
my wild appearance,
her eyes deep wells of sturdy love
that I gladly dive into,
her smile the sunlight warming me,
melting off the ice in my beard,
her arms, the arms that warm,
that gather me in
from all my stormy nightmares,
her lips the balm of timeless love,
that soothes this battered,
sea weary soul,
brings me back to life,
the touch of her hand so gently on my face,
as she stares silently and deeply into my eyes,
the gift of the gods and heaven and time.
A jolt jars me,
awakens me,
and I sit up in bed,
as the tossing of the vessel continues,
cruel waves still crashing against the side of the boat,
skies still stormy and gray
outside my cabin window,
and I pull myself up
the memory of her sweet dream
keeping me warm,
keeping me going,
as I search the horizon
for the sight,
any sight
of land.
|
THE PLACEBO EFFECT by jacob kaiser
I pick up the glass & pour the drink down the black hole, that once knew the soul by it’s name. I drink to the gods of whiskey & beer & wine, vodka, gin & indigestion, but they won’t return my calls anymore. My doctor prescribed me for the blue pill, the red pill, the white pill & the brown pill & I find it hard to believe in any sort of god when there are more pills than religions, more patients than disciples & more prescriptions than answers. I go to the place I no longer call home & picked up the picture of her & I & threw it against the wind to see how far it would travel. Where it swung on the invisible swing set, holding on tightly to chains of dry air & wind & then let go, to land right back on my welcome mat. |
CRAFT by foster neill
an urn of imperfection, round as moon, curves smooth as linen, grooved and turned with acute precision. One million dead writ in vine inscription should flower vinaceous around the base. Flowers go to waste put in the urn because it’s not a vase, rot and break the urn’s earned shape. Instead fill it with what sand’s at hand and place it on a window’s sill. Wait for a cloud to erase your shadow and the wind to still its pace, to make a mirror of a pebble lake. Look in your reflection at the filled flawed inside, at the uneven bottom. |
OSCODA, MI, SUMMER 1998 by derek sugamosto
1.
last year’s beach is
a dampened slit of sand.
still, the kids are determined
to spark it up with footfall,
and make the most of the water’s
brief recess.
no longer resembling the past,
still it’s nothing new,
not the red and white umbrellas,
nor the pinch of the swimsuit,
nor the implacable
rattling in the wristwatch.
it takes years to become young again.
perhaps there’s no
savagery to it, no disproportion
in the give and take,
only the difference of summers
and the wandering shade.
2.
growing older brings to mind
the recessing of seafoam,
how the bubbles are left
clinging to the sand
as the water goes sliding back.
the kids chase themselves
into horizon’s mouth.
stand guard. that’s you
in the mutation of fish eyes
that water, sand-strewn,
makes. your eyes follow
the disappearing embrace of the ebb
at the world’s dissolving edge.
3.
tonight you will awaken,
mortified, the sting of salt water
clenching your throat.
hunching over the nightstand,
you will try
and fail to recognize the clock’s face.
you’re here—
that’s land, there’s water.
you may swim or tread dirt,
but you are childless
so long as you slumber.
1.
last year’s beach is
a dampened slit of sand.
still, the kids are determined
to spark it up with footfall,
and make the most of the water’s
brief recess.
no longer resembling the past,
still it’s nothing new,
not the red and white umbrellas,
nor the pinch of the swimsuit,
nor the implacable
rattling in the wristwatch.
it takes years to become young again.
perhaps there’s no
savagery to it, no disproportion
in the give and take,
only the difference of summers
and the wandering shade.
2.
growing older brings to mind
the recessing of seafoam,
how the bubbles are left
clinging to the sand
as the water goes sliding back.
the kids chase themselves
into horizon’s mouth.
stand guard. that’s you
in the mutation of fish eyes
that water, sand-strewn,
makes. your eyes follow
the disappearing embrace of the ebb
at the world’s dissolving edge.
3.
tonight you will awaken,
mortified, the sting of salt water
clenching your throat.
hunching over the nightstand,
you will try
and fail to recognize the clock’s face.
you’re here—
that’s land, there’s water.
you may swim or tread dirt,
but you are childless
so long as you slumber.
