A Valentine for a piece of wood, Sylvia Manning

Mesquite Angel

“Angel: the candle that leans to the heart’s north.”
                               René Char, Leaves of Hypnos #16

Sitting one, spine straight, head high, proudly
facing due north, true as compass assurance,

anyone can see
you’re only of oldest mesquite tree

broken roughly, quite, its largest limb

wherein you dwelled these decades

until man in machine raised
its wide snout to break you roughly out,
blood red, anger in your bark-
created head and crown

audible even in awful noise
of machine going on to tear away
the other limbs and huisache.

Jagged sharded wood,
splintered hood of your headpiece
pointing to clouds above new caliche,
skirts swept as if side saddling
a mount beneath to bear you

wherever an angry angel
deems she must go
before they bring the chainsaw,
the blood moon, the fire.

Solms,
2/14/18 after

                                                2/05/18

Judith Janoo wins 1st place in Anita Andrews Award Poetry Contest [Austin]

Stazia McFadyen, of Austin, Texas, coordinator of the 2017 Poets for Human Rights event, sends this by e-mail:



Congratulations to the 1st and 2nd place winners of the 2017 Anita McAndrews Award Poetry Contest.

1st Place - "Take to the Streets, February 15, 2003" by Judith Janoo of  E. Burke, Vermont

 



 
Take to the Streets, February 15, 2003
            I wish I could shut up, but I can't, and I won't.  Desmond Tutu

Is it dangerous, she asked
exiting the bus against ten degree gusts,
walking Manhattan's Third Avenue,
dark casement awaking like Rembrandt
stroked the morning, our numbers
multiplying, spilling onto Second
with neglected appeals.
     Sure we were all mad
after the attacked, shocked back,
but what had these people done?
Wives of firefighters waved banners:
No blood for Oil, business people,
blue-collared, poor, frayed, disabled,
babies in strollers, Grace Pauley,
9/11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows,
Susan Sarandon spoke, and Desmond Tutu.
Half a million strong, said the man behind us
as we merged onto First, The reports will pinch it,
     say we're hippies, lefties, gut our numbers.
His suit had ridden many buses --
They always turn down the volume. The world
marched that day against a rampage that would
yield no chemicals or Al-Qaeda.  Those who've
walked the street never again see only pavement.
No, my daughter then told a friend, it isn't
dangerous to walk, only to not
say a word.
 



Stazja adds:  "Judith Janoo is a writer and yoga teacher. Her writing has won the Soul Making Keats award for poetry and the Vermont Award for Continued Excellence in Writing.  She is also a Dana Award Finalist."
_______________________________________________________________________________

2nd Prize - Pursuit of Life by Gabrielle Sinclair
 
Pursuit of Life

We walk at night
Moon lights our way
Helicopters hover
Searching their prey.

Harsh land trips us
desolate, dry
We've been walking for days
Baby, don't cry.

No one around?
You never know
The group is far ahead
Torn feet go slow.

No work at home
Can't feed my child
There's work in Florida
Weather's more mild.

What's left to do?
Risk I must take
End justifies the means
No choice to make.

No food or drink
Can't pack enough
Coyote did not say
The trip's so rough.

Snake bite killed one
Heat got one, too
Another just collapsed
What could we do?

Border is tight
We have to dare
More of us are dying
Nobody cares.

This land was ours
Another time
Pursuit of Liberty
Now is a crime.

Gabrielle has been an actor, singer, writer and editor. She currently lives in Lake Havasu City, Arizona with her significant others: Two cats, one dog and one man. She would like the United States Government to establish a Department of Peace.  

___________________________________________________________________________________

Stazja continues: "Grateful thanks to Judith Janoo and Gabrielle Sinclair for their permission to publish their works, and to all who entered this year's contest.
Thanks also to Kate Sweet and Anita Welch, who continue to support the Anita McAndrews Award Poetry Contest, and to Elyse Van Breemen and Sioux Hart for reading the poems at this year's Poets for Human Rights awards event."

With love,

Stazja McFadyen


 

Poetry that Matters

Here's someone's take on poetry making -- making it matter.  Tom Keene recently gave the Sunday morning talk at the UU church I attend here.  I especially liked this poem, so he sent it for us to share as well as anything from his website:  http://www.tomkeeneandthemuse.com.

Poetry that Matters

 

First, grasp the facts of whatever is

as to cut through and under mere appearance

and any consensus to deny.

 

Next, speak, write, whisper, shout

their untold-ring-true meanings.

 

Then, put these forth

like a fisherman’s bait

to hook the guts of any who listen,

enflame the passion of those who can hear.

 

Rouse them to rise

out of pretense into planting themselves,

put down roots, send up branches, bear fruit.

 

Tom Keene

November 10, 2017

San Antonio poet Tom Keene. 

Carol Youmans sent a poem after she left

About Poetry Making

When I picked up my pen,
I thought about reading to 34 earnest ears
Circled in a room
(If Jeannie forgot to come)
And I missed them so much
That I picked up the phone instead
And called a friend
I haven't talked to
in months.
                            Carol Youmans

a poem from Polish poet Tadeusz Rózewicz

poetry doesn't always

take the form

of a poem

after fifty years

of writing

poetry

may appear

to the poet

in the shape of a tree

a bird

flying away

light

it takes the shape

of lips

it nests in their silence

or it lives in a poem

devoid of form and content

                          Oct. 13, 1988


So  this is in line with an earlier question, whether or not a poem can exist without words.  I think.  Found a collection, Sobbing Superpower: selected poems of Tadeusz Rózewicz, in our coffeeshop down here this morning.     (posting from Texas, Sylvia Manning)

Last meeting for 2017, a potluck of poems was enjoyed by all.

LtoR: Phillip (his back to us), Dolores, Jim, Scott, Stephen, Mark, Jed, Mariel, Judith, Carter, Joanne, Jean in pink.

Since you can't see Steve Cahill, in pink behind the post, here's a picture of him alone, and a picture of his fellow Slam competitor, Marc Creavan:

Marc Creavan, 3rd place at the slam

Steve Cahill, 1st place winner at
 recent Highland Arts Center Slam (Greensboro)

Time and Eternity, by Judith Janoo

Judith Janoo

a poem in response to How to Be a Poet by Wendell Berry:


Time and Eternity
        "for patience joins time to eternity," Wendell Berry

There is no end to it
the way time eases
into a moment
makes it home
unblinking moves on
not hurried, not slow
minds its own
           no end to its grace
how it arrives as an offering
spans the hour
dropping sand as reddening
maples in pulsing wind, flare
blazon against white birches
slender sway
dropping leaves that dance
drift, settle
as a note that's held to full
measure, rendering
to earth, sky,
this universe and
the next
its silent enticement
never looks back
needs no map,
comes and gently
goes without closing the door,
time, a string of pearls
a lamppost for the light of eternity.

                                             Judith Janoo

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