February - Poem 6
Stars / Kristine Anderson
The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff.”
—Carl Sagan
More of them in the universe than dollars in the federal deficit
and though I can’t even fathom a host of septillion—
sounds more like a reptile I’d like to avoid—
I can imagine each giant gaseous ball,
thanks to years reading science fiction
and close encounters with questionable chili.
And aren’t we humans lucky to have been shaped
from such celestial ingredients?
Next time I go to the dentist, or cut myself and bleed,
or talk myself out of another slice
of dessert, I’ll think of stepping outside on a clear
night, trying to count the dots of glitter in the sky.
Ode to hands / Bee Cordera
Hands, love incarnate,
beings of creation,
destruction, some who have lived
lifetimes without knowing
the love of pen to paper,
carving letters out of purgatory.
Or how you pour my likeness
onto the blank page.
Or how hands cradle curves
our body’s first food.
Or how gentle touches
revive the fallen souls
of our abuse ridden past.
How hands like ours embrace
to create to overcome family curses
Loudness of Solitary Confinement / Barbara Audet
When years advance,
There's no one
to fall asleep with at your side.
When time refuses
to stand still,
somber emptiness
of missing shadows,
bears down.
Relentless.
As rain that never ends.
One hears a sound,
one's own life force,
captured in eardrum hollows,
Unwelcome.
A going steady hum
ever present
in the waxing
early hours.
Revived.
Like a living
tuning fork,
hit for summons
from furtive sleep.
Awaken.
Solitary once again.
BUDDHA’S SPOON / Ashby Logan Hill
It is unfortunate that the sun does not travel backwards
“How the lilie is not a lotus, looming long above the crest of lake,” you said. “It looks like a little spoon,” I said, “as if the warmth of the fog above the water, Buddha’s breath, just might keep in balance of his, his curled fingertips, pressed to the tip of his nose, like a paperweight, somehow dangling just above the nostrils.” “I wonder if he can hear us,” you said.
“Do you think he likes golden raisins in his oatmeal?” I said. “I know it’s not a spoon,” you said. “But I want it to be.” “Sometimes your eyes can play dirty tricks on you,” I said. “Do you think along the way, and after his travels back, beneath the Bodhi tree, he contemplated Spumoni?” you said. “You know, I’m not totally sure,” I said. “We’ve been standing here all day and still he won’t tell us, two lotus flowers floating in the sun.”
Italicized line from E. Ethelbert Miller's "Michelle"
A To Do List / Amy Marques
you mean?
I mean
I knew--I hope
I pray a tune of silence
I ask
I give
I justified, I know
I have--I may
I can, I suppose...
S
ource Material: A Tale of Two Cities, p. 138
Sex / Sonia Sophia Sura
scared, I
asked him to rest
his hand
on me
and say:
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
You are safe
Thought Terminating Cliché / Samuel Spencer
“It is what it is.”
They say, as they toss away
what is that could have been.
“Boys will be boys.”
A parent asserts, withholding
their son the joy of
being a delicate man.
“Guns don’t kill people. People kill people."
A man explains
who has never, nor will ever be a killing machine.
“This is just how it’s done.”
My grandfather refrains
as he teaches me how to serve a
tennis ball. Years later, I learned
a better way, and my grandfather was dead.
“Everything happens for a reason.”
Excuses a person who hates
their own ability, or lack thereof,
to change.
“That’s just life.”
Retort the unliving.
