Wishing In One Hand

Wishing in One Hand

I wish I had the ruby ring

round the hummingbird's throat,

the hail and promise that sings

to a mate with a scarab green float

and not the rooster's red wattle

that won't even keep the pot full.

I wish I had the filling cup

so lovingly brimmed up

with honey wine and ginger root

and not the rubber boot

from which the piss is poured

of cowboys drunk and bored

before the Leper King

claims that artificial skin

to slog his warty way

through unspeakable muck all day.

I wish most I had the rainbow after the storm,

where hope uncovers the heart and gives it form.

~August 2013

 posted for    real toads
Challenge: The Poetry of Sara Teasdale
Kerry O'Connor brings the work and style of  the August-born poet, Sara Teasdale, to our attention, and asks for a poem inspired by "the words of this remarkable woman."

Image: Cattleya Orchid and Three Hummingbirds, by Martin Johnson Heade.
1871.  Public domain via wikipaintings.org

The Farewell Book

 

The Farewell Book

I always keep the Book of Order

close by my chaos bed

at the masthead of longing,

to lift a half-numb hand, touch its

sleeping lover's cover, think

I'm not alone.

The Book has first and last page

but only a hole in the center, infinite,

secret, full of talismans, gauds and baubles,

wrack and whatnots, bones and blood,

astrolabes and artifacts of

someone else's life that is my own.

 

I sang out 

the genius from the cavity;

all things marked with your name.

I made for you the kiss

of peace 

and the moon on a stick.

There

you were born to lie,

to slither up and slide

your bendable spine into

the hammock of that crescent, to

murmur with flickering tongue

divine

the language of mind to mind,

but when at last I put

my feet to the morning's board,

I felt only the pricking crackle of

the skin you'd left on the floor.

Still I go on, a lunatic singing apart

flying waves of darkness
with a used moon

and a hollow book.

~August 2013

 

posted for     real toads

Challenge: Fireblossom Friday:

 the book within the story within the poem

The incomparable Fireblossom asks us to think of matryoshkas, to pick a favorite poem and nest it in a story with a book and a reader all in an ever-shrinking embrace, or something like that (see above link for a more coherent exposition.) I've chosen not one but two of my favorite poems by Wallace Stevens to nest--In this unholy matryoshka, I have used various words and phrases from:

The Idea of Order at Key West
(text and reading by Stevens)

Farewell to Florida

(text)

Photo © joyannjones 2013

Political Doggerel

Political Doggerel

Four politicians sitting on a fence;

one showed his Weinie--away he went.

Three politicians going out for lunch;

one had surgery so he can't eat much.

Two politicians knocking on the door;

one promised change then dropped it on the floor.

One politician waiting all her life

to be something besides that Somebody's wife.

~August 2013

55 lost votes for     the g-man

Process Notes: Hey, I can't always have weird dreams just because it's Friday 55.

To those fortunate enough to live outside the US, please forgive the tedium of American political obsession here. I am referring to a recent scandal and to some past and present contenders in the quadrennial White House gladiatorial combat. You probably don't want to know.

Images sourced from Texts from Hillary