Tuesday, May 4, 2021

poesia early/spring 2019 // posted may 2021, unedited


thursday. 31jan
Lentriculostriate, cerebellum, medulla oblangata
Early light spills in the windows. 
Grey, blue, the eyelid of a periwinkle giant,
somewhere close. Murmuring the parts of the brain that I try to stuff in mine. 
Telencephalon, basal ganglia, fissure of sylvain. 
I have a mum who makes me coffee 
It sits now, pre dawn besides the notes and the screen. 
I have a friend who wrote a lullaby for our nessabel ten years past, 
its notes I keep playing. 
warm and delight, calling up a golden October of newness. 
The friend sits warm in an arctic chill. 
Our silvansol wanders in with frisson and loud hullo, the goldengirl of ten plays notes in the rooms across the lightening house. Murmurs, shouts. Coffee on my tongue. 
Temporal lobe, soma, wernicke. Vibrations, vibrations, axons, strings.  

13feb
There’s a ball of quaking earth within me
Querulous, quaking, queasy 
But there is a horizon out this window...
wide, solid, curve of earth. 
Wide solid curve. 

16feb
Walking in the rain
here
this red yellow brown below, blue above thirsty land
is a thousand thank yous. 
thanks thanks thanks. thank you. 
the kiss of water, the grey. 
the smell of daffodil water in the vase. 
past fresh beauty.
whispering spring. 
whispering wait. 

(while watching bacon, cleaning the kitchen, soli drawing dragons; jack gilbert and valentine’s breakfast) 
dear our grandparents
beloved our priscilla and bob
I miss you. 
I miss your tables. And your talk. 
I miss the stunning simplicity of your homes
The beauty 
The you. 
Tea 
     Talk
Tea
    Talk
Tea
     Talk
I miss the blankets of your love. So much love. 
How I wish I could ask you, now that I have a decade of parenting 
About how you did it. And why
The pains. The hurts. The deep dark of ache and sadnesses. The ones we know now- and then?- can not be blanketed. 
The love and the love. 
And if I was, again at your table
I would probably balk. 
Stutter. Stop. 
Bask in the utter gift of you. 
the utter gift of you two. 
(the tea) the love. 
Love 
Love. 


18feb.
jessa and dean’s kitchen 
the coffee without milk dark of 5:40am 
february. 
a circle of light at the counter 
(grain of wood, conus medullaris, an orchid, the pattern of the rugs on the light white oak floor, cauda equina )
like the hopper painting 
things are cliche for a reason
(bright orange of clementine, filum terminale, shy yellow of banana)
an oasis amidst the dark,
dark another kind of welcome
but this island, bright, feeling of safe. 
warm. 
coffee with cream. 
the morning tiptoes in. 

That eve. 
Something about our ships. 

28feb
the shallow sea of your breathing
here with me,
it is not so rare, but not so common either. 
everynight here with you, sea breath in, sea breath out,
gifts.  
I walk my fingers across the sheetsweep between us, and rest their tips on your 
bones, 
the sweet dip beneath the crest. 
iliac ridge,
Sea of Iliac. 
your breath out. your breath in. 
ease. deep. ease
wish whisper water. 
snow on the mountain,
we missed the deep, caught the deep
blue and white and brown across the crests
the melt drip drop
off our walls, the white to brown
making small seas
iliac sea. 
your breaths in the shallows. 
Our breath in the deeps. 

2march
You know what I love?
The longer days, more sunlight to drink, starting about mid February
wending our way to this March. 
Metal cups filled with coffee, warm and warm hours into studying. 
Saying Acetabulum. Acetabulum. 
Probably mis-saying Acetabulum. 
Shelves and shelves of books. 
Interrupting studying, again, to write this poem. Breath coffee-soaked. 
Shouldn’t love that. But I do. 

4march
Just at dawn, another neuro test/distractagirl

Other things I love 
learning the body, 
Hours and hours on
partial maps 
that light up paths 
of places
I never knew were there. 
spinoreticular, pascinian corpuscles, rubrospinal
early, early morning light
Your head in my arm
Its dense weight a beloved stone
The soft weights of the children
In whatever form they give us. 

You, my love, are a bearer of lightness 
and light
A bearer of irreverent glee
and glad. 
For these, amidst seas of other things, 
I am ridiculously grateful. 

The day we didn’t do powder
Or did some
But not all
Was a day filled with open breathtaking vistas
New trails and 
friends- long held, seldom seen
Overpriced food on cold benches
Like the other side
But this side instead. 

15apr // look at 2021 iteration
the beauty we’ve been granted. 

We take up so much more
than our share of planet 
And live in a high dry place 
meant for just 
a few of us,
So very few. 
Rivers that wind like thread 
Crops that fight for rain
And still 
I want to lick this dirt, swallow this sky
Eat the red brown earth
So in love.  
This beauty we’ve been granted
The beauty. This. 
Wishes. 
May we share what has been stolen. 
May what was given, be known. 

Blossoms. 
Neuro.  
Words. 
The pier. 
Hawk 
Pancakes 

Donor; being a donor.
heart outside one's body.

24april
Went out this morning, not super early
To walk the bode, and sip some coffee...
but the earth was welcome with 
yesterday’s rain
and today’s birdsong
sweet sweet air
and so,
I began to weed (not my usual morning ritual my mama can tell you)
fingers in red dirt,
taking out those small stubborn plants
deliberately
Around the stone, under the stones, 
Thinking of time. And peace. 
The land we clear, 
the sticks and stones and dirt before us and after. 
every moment long long ago, unspooling, echoed, 
and those a bouquet of hours just picked...easteregg laughter up and down our arroyo hills, easterfrocks caught in breeze. 
and right here, at my toes, 
the ones who’ve stayed-
creatures of eons 
caught in rock dresses, their ridged wonder a constant surprise. 


3may
for Rae

Why do we travel?
For the the light on our love’s face as we look from the darkened room to the sun-basked balcony
A building intricate in its angles and stories
Cold beer on a warm tile table
Coffee in a warm, round cup. Tea. 
A lit up billboard, so familiar in its utter strangeness
Crowds milling amidst chatter and exhaust 
a stranger’s lilt of laughter across a street 
A path leading up
Music around a corner, the view around another
The sweep of blue or green or city 
Two people caught by a window, delicious food unnoticed as they revel in details of a day. 

4may
the twelve apostles
So many apostles. So many feasts. So many betrayals. So many gifts. 
These twelve. or three.  whatever was done, whatever was waiting.
I. Olfactory. pink and white blooms of our twinned plum trees. Purple crabapple.  Lilacs soon. Coffee. Always coffee. 
II. Optic. 
VIII. Vestibulocochlear. There are crystals inside our ears- the utricles and saccules to be semiexact - that float on a gelatinous layer, like a cap, on hair cells inside canals. Otoliths, the word like whispers after new rain. Oto. Lith. Earstones. They sway as we sway, opposite direction actually, back and forth, up and down. Send signals to the vestibulocerebellum and vestibular nuclei. Information all the time. Calculating. Responding. Making major corrections and micro movements. Every minute.  Our bodies in space. In relation to self. To others. Balance and proprioception. Twirling, running. Just bending and standing. Crystals in gel on hairs inside canals that keep us upright and steady on the earth. It’s incredible we work at all. 
XI. Accessory. Innervates the sternocleidastoid and trapezius muscles she said lovingly. Rolling around the syllables on her tongue (see XII).  A shrug. A circus. A handstand. A hug. The social justice bigtop we are sometimes part of; our girl on the trapeze. 
XII. hypoglosseal. 

One of the apostles runs her hand across the grain of the table, grabs her glass, rose of course, and lifts it to reciprocate the toast. 

8may
pieces that didn’t make it into poems, late winter/spring 2019

today, walking on the trail, it rained so little I could count the rain drops, 
ever less darkening skies. 
Bubbles, cousins, eggs in flowers and chalk
Exquisite volcanos, rising in open palms, unencumbered to the west of albuquerque 
Pancakes every morning on our piece of pier.
Spring ballgowns dancing through fields in tesuque, 
The early green fields of cienaga. 
Soapboxes and wildflowers, the prick of cactus spine,
the curated canvases of lilacs. 
The two toy ships anchored to our ceilings, holding dreams. Dreams and dreams and real things. 

8july
petra = stone
ichor = the fluid that runs through the veins of the gods
warm dry wind in the setsun, the rain of just yesterday feels so far away. 
Golden hour. A golden fleece. 
the buzz and chant of an oft hidden insect. 
No golden scarab this; the translucent wings and fat greybody hum. 
Apricots. Rain. The smell as it hits thirst and rock. Children in puddles; a sky wide open. giddiness. 
we rush toward miracles. 
conjure the gods. 

what the what? anything more stunning than that?

last poem/midsummer july 
Petrichor
Quotidian 
Chiaroscuro 
Palimpsest 
Ciacadas 
Incantations
weave the spell. 

For robin on my birthday// sum equals the parts (late winter, spring, early summer), 2019
never given, but now posted (4may21)


Saturday, February 4, 2017

Praise Song for the Day // Elizabeth Alexander

poem17.
Praise Song for the Day
Elizabeth Alexander
 
A Poem for Barack Obama’s Presidential Inauguration
 
Each day we go about our business,
walking past each other, catching each other’s
eyes or not, about to speak or speaking.

All about us is noise. All about us is
noise and bramble, thorn and din, each
one of our ancestors on our tongues.

Someone is stitching up a hem, darning
a hole in a uniform, patching a tire,
repairing the things in need of repair.

Someone is trying to make music somewhere,
with a pair of wooden spoons on an oil drum,
with cello, boom box, harmonica, voice.

A woman and her son wait for the bus.
A farmer considers the changing sky.
A teacher says, Take out your pencils. Begin.

We encounter each other in words, words
spiny or smooth, whispered or declaimed,
words to consider, reconsider.

We cross dirt roads and highways that mark
the will of some one and then others, who said
I need to see what’s on the other side.

I know there’s something better down the road.
We need to find a place where we are safe.
We walk into that which we cannot yet see.

Say it plain: that many have died for this day.
Sing the names of the dead who brought us here,
who laid the train tracks, raised the bridges,

picked the cotton and the lettuce, built
brick by brick the glittering edifices
they would then keep clean and work inside of.

Praise song for struggle, praise song for the day.
Praise song for every hand-lettered sign,
the figuring-it-out at kitchen tables.

Some live by love thy neighbor as thyself,
others by first do no harm or take no more
than you need. What if the mightiest word is love?

Love beyond marital, filial, national,
love that casts a widening pool of light,
love with no need to pre-empt grievance.

In today’s sharp sparkle, this winter air,
any thing can be made, any sentence begun.
On the brink, on the brim, on the cusp,

praise song for walking forward in that light.

Friday, February 3, 2017

Mother to Son // Langston Hughes

poem16.
Mother to Son
Langston Hughes

Well, son, I'll tell you.
Life for me ain't been no crystal stair.
It's had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor--
Bare.
But all the time
I'se been a-climbin' on,
And reachin' landin's,
And turnin' corners,
And sometimes goin' in the dark
Where there ain't been no light.
So boy, don't you turn back.
Don't you set down on the steps
'Cause you finds it's kinder hard.
Don't you fall now--
For I'se still goin', honey,
I'se still climbin',
And life for me ain't no crystal stair.

Still I Rise // Maya Angelou

poem15.
Still I Rise
Maya Angelou

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like the moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops,
Weakened by my soulful cries?

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own backyard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

Wednesday, February 1, 2017

Bread & Roses // Hakim Bellamy

poem 14.
Bread & Roses
Hakim Bellamy

The very first unions in America
Were brought here by boatBroken by backBy whipRapeAnd rope 
Nowadays
LiesAnd a bogeyman economyDo the trick
The only thing scarier
Than laborIs losing it
Even the House
And SenateCan come togetherAround houseAnd fieldDivide and conquer
Give us power
But not positionGive us personnelBut not privilegeGive us responsibilityBut not rightsOr profitsOr shares 
Give us a sniff
Of American exceptionalismGet us drunkOff of upward mobilityPut us behind the wheelOf the American DreamUntil we launch ourselvesInto a windshieldThat will not let us ejectOr escapeThis cabin 

I come from
A long line of laborersA lineage of long Black men 
Who nowadays
Only unionize for sportWho are eitherRich enough to be locked outOr poor enoughTo be locked in
But back then
Were Memphis enoughTo get Dr. KingTo detour toward deathIn the name of fairness
Air Jordan-esque working conditions
Laceless wagesBootsThat were begging for straps 
We are Colonial Philadelphia
1806ersJourneymenConvicted of criminal conspiracy 
We are New York (1829)
Workingmen’s PartyWhen sixty hoursA six-day workweekWas radical

Every morning
We wake up Knights of LaborTo whistles of workAnd whispers of worse
Integrated women
And our own Negro spirituals of sortsHold the forts
At a time when mining companies
Would send dynamite husbandsHome in a bucket
And Mothers
Like JonesWho lived in homesRented from the employerFed familyWith currencyOnly good at the company storeHad three daysTo replace “Papa”With one of her sonsSo production doesn’t sufferNo matter how young we wasNo matter how much she does
We are immigrants
Mollies (1877) pushed too farWe are the childrenWorked too hardThe reason Mary Harris marchedFrom the City of Brotherly LoveTo Teddy Roosevelt’s front porch 

We found our own Congress
Of Industrial OrganizationsTo replace the oneThat has forsaken us 
We are sit-down strikes
In the buildings they valueWith our bodiesThat they do not 
We are wage equity
And wage war 
We are ripped-off scabs
That will not bandage their cuts after we strike
Only band together
Our bloodAnd heal 
We are still leaping
From ninth floor windowsAt the Triangle Waist Company (1911)

We are Clara Lemlich
We are Dolores HuertaWe are Cesar ChavezWe are Samuel GompersWe are Gabriel ProsserWe are Lucy Gonzalez Parsons (IWW)And we are Rosie the Riveter 
We are the hand on the Bible
Denying we’re socialistWe are the witches of Taft-Hartley 
We are holy, Jerry Fallwell
Salt of the EarthWho forever put love of GodBefore love of Greed
You said,
“Labor unions should study and read the Bibleinstead of asking for more money . . .” 
But we are pickers
Who reap and sowAnd read 
Sirach 34:22
To take away a neighbor’s livingis to murder him; to deprive an employee of his wageis to shed blood. 
We teamsters and longshoremen
And just like youWe ain’t perfect
Proverbs 14:31
He who oppresses a poor man,insults his Maker. 
We are closed factories
And empty mouthsAuto, textiles, and steel
We are the meek
Who inherit ourselvesWe are the lambThe sacrifice and the carpenterthat said 
The worker deserves his wages.
Luke 10:7 
We are the people
Who power dreamsAnd profitAnd are for grantedAnd are forgotten
We are the people who brought you the weekend
We aren’t coming home empty-handedWe are back pockets of college tuitionWe are stuffed between the mattresses of future Christmases 
We are smiles
On our children’s facesAnd even though we are sometimes facelessWe are food in the fridge
We are hero and heroine
We are coming back
Coming homeEvery nightIn one piece 
Please, please believe
That we are all hard workAnd belief
We are about 5:05
5:306:15WeAre bread and rosesFor dinner


I have faith in Chile // Salvador Allende

poem13.
I have faith in Chile
Salvador Allende

I have faith in Chile and its destiny. Other men will
overcome this dark and bitter moment when treason
seeks to prevail. Keep in mind that, much sooner than later,
great avenues will again be opened, through which will pass
the free man, to construct a better society.

September 11, 1973

At Night // Jimmy Santiago Baca

poem12.
At Night
Jimmy Santiago Baca

I lie in bed
and hear the soft throb of water
surging through the ditch,
from extreme to extreme water bounds,
clumsy country boy,
stumbling over fallen logs and rubber tires
to meet a lover
who awaits in her parents' house, window open.

As I used to for love.

Now gray-black hair,
vigorous cheeks, weathered brow, chapped lips,
dismal thoughtful eyes,
I float in brown melancholy on lazy currents
of memory, studying my reflection
on the water this night,
with distant devotion,
a swimmer who has forgotten how to swim.