My Rat Friend

 my rat friend

lives in my garage.

i feed him

kibble, neat.

friend owl is hungry as well--

they play cat-and-mouse.

moon is high

owl on the branch waits.

neighbor has

a floodlight.

when it shuts off, rat comes out.

so far so good, bud.

in summer

a hawk eats pigeons

rat is safe.

in winter

i watch owl watch my rat friend

feasting in the dark.

___________

a shadorma for Dverse OLN.

The Wedding of the Mourning Dove (a de Chirico)

 

A crippled dove is dying; her wound a dusky red

in the maple's crook she's hiding.

Her heart her wedding song; herself the newlywed.

A carmine blaze upon her breast to mark the place she's bled

like a penitent confiding

A crippled dove is dying; her wound a dusky red

The purple splay of sunset now reveals a fraying thread

in her tiny breast subsiding--

her heart her wedding song; herself the newlywed.

Beneath her injured wing, she hides her tawny head

as the sun is lower gliding

a crippled dove is dying; her wound a dusky red. 

The summer grass, soon bereft, would take her place instead

except for circumstance dividing--

her heart her wedding song; herself the newlywed.

The presiding night has finished; the ceremony said--

her new master toward the threshold swiftly striding.

A crippled dove is dying; her wound a dusky red--

her heart her wedding song; herself the newlywed. 

_______

the de Chirico is similar to a pantoum, except that tercets replace quatrains. 

Kitty (a pantoum)

 

Your cat has killed my singing bird

she sunk her teeth into its throat

and now, its every song deferred

it wears a reddened funeral coat.

She sunk her teeth into its throat

and left its body on the mat

an ornament for Charon's boat

does kitty give a damn for that?

She left its body on the mat

and licks her paws without a care

does kitty give a damn for that

or anybody anywhere?

She licks her paws without a care

her tail she'll switch in plain disdain

for anybody anywhere

she casually causes pain.

Her tail she'll switch in plain disdain

for having killed my singing bird

or casually causing pain

by any bloody song deferred.

____________

The Word Garden Word List is very much active and can be found HERE. 

Mistral

 

In Spring the madding winds arrive

and leave the winter to its dreams

of fools such as my love and I.

In your eyes Provence does lie--

false Spring is never what it seems

when Mistral sings the lullaby. 

The ring is left to rust and die

by drowning pool or icy stream

while scudding clouds above it fly.

Your wind has temper come alive

to kill the bud or turn the cream

and howl unchecked to Italy.

So comes the Mistral, mad with spring

My love, destroying everything.

_______

for Dverse Meeting the Bar "Wild Wind."

The mistral is a strong, cold, northwesterly wind that blows from southern France into the Gulf of Lion in the northern Mediterranean. It produces sustained winds averaging 31 miles an hour.

It is said that madness occurs particularly often in the Spring. I believe it.

Looking For The Light

 

When you look in the right place, there it will be.

(I'm talking about light.)

Your eye interprets everything from within.

Blue skies, gray skies, all an illusion.

The light of your life isn't in a face or a star.

When you look in the right place, there it will be. 

You have thought yourself a moon, reflecting.

Rods and cones are the heart's handmaidens.

(I'm talking about light.)

That person, that sunrise, they are lit because you lit them,

just as they lit you, from loneliness, darkness.

Your eye interprets everything from within. 

______

A cascade poem for What's Going On? "The Coming of the Light"

Fetch

 And now comes my fetch in the mist by the slough

unnoticed by the sheep who eat the bursting sloes.

An unwelcome messenger, my double pale and blue,

to snap the stem that holds my soul and reap what doesn't rot.

I'm an altered, repetitious hag, with just the grave for new,

my breakfast made of river stones and set on plates of ice.

The horse may shed its harness, the ship may shed its crew.

I likewise shed this life entire, and no more question pose,

then--like the laurel root--decay, dissolving where it grew.

_______

for Word Garden Word List #19 (at The Sunday Muse.) 

this poem is a "Magic 9" poem, with rhyme scheme aba cad aba, or "abracadabra" minus the two r's. 

when laurel grows in a swampy area, or "slough", the roots will rot. 

The Drowsing Moon

 

"Take the ribbon from your hair

shake it loose and let it fall"

--Kris Kristofferson

The moon drowses now, in her compartment

made of asters on a train to the sea

and she seeks in her dream the department

of missent lilies, mislaid carelessly.

Her petition is dancing so sweetly

that the gods search their memories for tears

to stitch where her silver crescent appears.

The moon is blemished now, by dawn and time

and the train master calls for her sorrow

to be served as gin with a wedge of lime

and then forwarded on to tomorrow

where what they can't buy, the asters borrow

a mixing of winds as a bandage to bind

her with thread of forgetting, serpentined.

_____

for Tuesday Poetics: Fay Collins

art by Fay Collins

this poem is a rhyme royal

Good-Girl Dandy

It gave her pain

to part with anything

as if piss were wine

and pennies perfect

tears from Jesus' eyes;

as if fun were debit and deduction

from the piggy bank of Good-Girl Dandy.

It gave her pain

not to ledger the world

and if nails were dear

and the wood too fine

she would purse her lips

at the Sufferer on the tower, and

serve Him vinegar and year-old candy.

_______

for dverse poetics "Halloweeny Humans."

10 Lines About Lucy Medicine Crow

 The dog she got was black and white and wild

and loved the world as a fool, or God does.

For her part, she loved two things--dog and child.

No love for cold or calm or rest because,

starved with fever is what she is, and was.

The dog will dream, the child will change unseen,

calling from their secret side, "Come with us

and speak no more the name that we have been."

Her hair turned white in change from black that was,

a semaphore for fading feet and paws.

______

this form is called a decuain.

Fascination

I defer in all things to the gray cat
perched on the porch rail as the sun goes down.
His disinterest is my fascination.

The moon slipping from the sky is another fascination
of mine, and too, I think, of the gray cat
though he is silent as he shakes himself and jumps down.

You are the one I can't forget, like a book I can't put down
written by a stranger untouched by my fascination 
with stories, with you, with the moon and the gray cat.

The gray cat pounces down on shadows; I watch in fascination. 
_____

a tritina for fussy little forms with Marian.

this poem is an homage of sorts for one of my favorite poems--"untitled" by Carl Rickert, which appeared in the September 1973 issue of The Speakeasy Culture. 

With some trepidation, I am adding Carl's poem here because it is impossible to find and should be read widely, imo. I have tried to search him out to get permission, but after 45 years it's impossible. Carl, if you see this and object, let me know and i will remove it. Again i stress that the following is a poem by CARL RICKERT, not me, but my poem at top is an homage to it and its ideas about gray cats.

"Untitled" by Carl Rickert

No one at all that night

saw the moon drop from the sky,

save myself

and a gray cat walking by,

looking

perhaps,

for another gray cat,

looking

for something,

looking,

maybe,

for me,

because I am the master of the gray cat,

and life,

my life,

the cat's life,

your life,

maybe,

if you give it to me,

and the gray cat,

The gray cat helps me make my decisions,

decisions on life,

my life and your life,

if that's your desire,

The gray cat has no sense of responsibility,

seeks only pleasure

and other gray cats,

at night,

or in the day

if it has that feeling,

but I seek his answer,

perhaps because of that lack of responsibility,

I have that,

you know,

responsibility,

for the gray cat,

and you,

if you would like,

my life would change,

and yours,

and the gray cat's,

but chances

are born in the moon we watched,

until last night,

when it dropped from the sky,

and only I was the witness,

for the gray cat

upon questioning,

saw little

save another gray cat,

or the hope of seeing another gray cat,

so you'll have to take my word,

and the fact

that the moon no longer appears,

and that despite the change in my life

I still want you,

waiting of course

to see what the gray cat will say.

In A Room-Box

In a room-box with unmade bed, you bloomed
(in time, ajar)
In a room-box with night-sign light, you bloomed
(a venom star)
On the wall, shadow of your swaying head
(crepuscular)
Your odd gift of what is shown, then vanished,
In after-image of gorgeous damage. 
_______ 

for Fussy Little Forms--cavatina.

tricube screwage

fiery hot
scalding love
what's it like?

Durga's tiger
stops for lunch
(villagers).

melty eyes
boil my heart
o m g

torrid kiss
from my doll
do me Ken!

for fuck's sake
stop writing.
I'll pay you.
_____

tricubes.

Three Short Poems

"Jones"

Jones
finds Empty
and fills it
with lonesome lies
in a fake truth suit.
There were better Parts Unknown meant for you.
_____

"Chop Shop"

Chop
this shit
into lines-
it still won't be
poetry, baby.
You have to pay to learn that foreign tongue.
_____

"Mercy Clouds"

Look--
water
ripple-topped.
Gone tomorrow
with the mercy clouds.
Kiss me now. The sun will warm my suitcase.
______

for Fussy Little Forms--tetractys. 

Suicide happens when a person's emotional pain exceeds their ability to cope with that pain. But there is help. If you are in trouble, pick up that ten ton phone--tomorrow can be better, even if you don't believe it right now. National Suicide Prevention Help Line: 1-800-273-TALK.

"Goodbye...my friend. I didn't know you, but I've been places you've been." (Tim Hardin)

 

Hiding

I am hiding where you can't see
me, down where the roots find 
winding ways and secret water,
daughter of both silence and 
random lightning strike.

I am hiding where you can't touch,
such a stand-offish lonely sort
aboard a black-winged bird
absurd and glorious in her particular 
vernacular of singular songs and caws
jackdaws and crows
know better than a professor at his books.

I am hiding in the red detritus
I might as soon worship as any
many-strictured deity, and yet,
getting it wrong, being found out--
shouting and giving myself away,
saying yes, I really do reduce to
blues in the afternoon sung by
my own traitor voice on these pages like a kiss.
__________

for Fussy Little Forms: Chained Rhyme.

 

Two Rondelets

 TELL ME, DOCTOR

Tell me, doctor
about disease, about malaise.
Tell me, doctor
what your nurse saw that so shocked her--
experiments that left their trace--
then, after you arrange your face,
tell me, doctor.

PRETTY DAISIES

Pretty daisies
and daffodils around the lawn.
Pretty daisies
soothing agitated crazies
their natures all to hell and gone
mad in evening, calm at dawn.
Pretty daisies. 
_______

Rondelets for "Fussy Little Forms" at Toads.

M-M-M-M-My Shadormas

zen master
drinks too much coffee
says to class
pardon me
leaves lotus, runs down the hall
but not fast enough
____

zen master
visits his sister
she hands him
new nephew.
our bodies are illusions
but shoulder puke real
_____

zen master
ponders the spring rain
when stupid
car breaks down.
meditation does no good--
fucking thing is shit 
_____

zen master
can control his mind
but sometimes
unlucky
erection comes at wrong time
don't stand up just yet
______

zen master
says souls can migrate
from body
to body.
unsightly skin condition
will end when you do
______

zen master
has the hots for jane
but he must
ignore this.
concentrate on breathing or
think about baseball 
_______

zen master
should avoid dairy
but didn't
and now he
hopes he will not blow sour note
while teaching flute class
______

zen master
left his trash novel
on the stand
by the bed
with just ten pages to go.
"be here now" my ass
_____

zen master
opens his chakras
to clear them
and cleanse them
wishes there was E-Z-Off
or some shit like that
_____

zen master
sleeps on a pallet
on the floor
but dreams of
room with big-ass hotel bed
escort and happy ending
_____

zen master
hates fireblossom lots
and wishes
she would stop
writing stupid shadormas
with him butt of joke
______ 

for: Fussy Little Forms/ Shadorma at Real Toads.