VIRGINIA STEM OWENS said
it was all coming back to me, the wonder of the world and its immense possibilities. it was not only schoolwork that aroused this hunger. i was as ravenous for sensation as any infant. the sheer physicality of life swamped my senses.
i remember with terrible clarity the irises blooming that spring, the smell of the damp, darkened loam through which their spears thrust, the tender fringed flesh of the petals. to inhale the mingled scents was like sexual surrender, a melting, an inexplicable weeping p.37
and i related. I RELATED
I said
the flowers had us
high as kites
hungry in the groin
after the father
r e : X X V I
To look at the tree is not to be distracted in mortality
although the watcher fears the wind’s tearing off the last flowers
and the tree’s turning invisible and dull — is to look at the tree:
is to look at the t r e e :
is now to be unable to speak of these new white life-giving burs
is not to start from the flower; but is, to go back, lay your head
against the trunk, to embrace what feels, to suffer weight — is
to prophesy so far forward to the time these spines solidify
where now they are babies milk-toothed, like marrow bone:
is to strike the dominant of the tree: here, more than
deep in the roots; here, more than in the leaves’ crotch;
here, more than any thought you can remember thinking:
concentrate.
‘The Plenitude We Cry For’
poem no. XXVI
by Sarah Appleton, 1972
re: THESE DAYS
I sit in the bathroom
and try to remember
how I had
first learned
French pronunciation.
I cannot
understand time.
Living
in the present,
next week seems
a long way away…
from These Days by Pam Brown
published in Otis Rush
.
sketch: KITE
I hope to not have withheld love
and wonder if I should send up a kite?
Guest post by Helena Rosebery.
A visual response to my original poem, it’s 25 degrees outside:
“Sprrooosh!
Bubbles rising.
And in my heart I could drink this whole pool.”
Q U I E T O N E
f r i d a y , 1 0 p . m .
t h e c i t y p a r t i e s . h o u s e m a t e g e a r s u p .
m e , a t h o m e
w i t h p a s t e l s a n d h e r b t e a …
r e : J E L L Y F I S H
Jellyfish translucent as onionskin pulse through the bay.
Davey gets one on his oar and lifts it up like a dripping wad
of plastic wrap. I see others floating in and out of the shallows
changing colour like globes of thin photosensitive glass…
From ‘Jellyfish’
by Judith Beverage
s m o k e s i g n a l s .
Archangel Michael has a partner blog: ‘the Remnants of Despot Stefan’s Castle’. Going live today!
Diving Into the Wreck/adrienne rich
I am having to do this
not like Cousteau with his
assiduous team
abroad the sun-flooded schooner
but here alone.
There is a ladder
The ladder is always there
hanging innocently
close to the side of the schooner.
We know what it is for,
we who have used it.
Otherwise
it’s a piece of maritime floss
some sundry equipment.
I go down.
Rung after rung and still
the oxygen immerses me
the blue light
the clear atoms
of our human air.
I go down.
From ‘Diving Into the Wreck’
by Adrienne Rich
.
Reminding me of The Big Blue, that delicious piece of sound and light by Luc Besson,
.
and prompting me to get my low-fi illustration on.
.
Dear Ms. Rich, you kill it every time.
