https://whitecatgrove.wordpress.com/2023/12/03/poem-deer-singing/

#POEM: DEER-SINGING

Posted on December 3, 2023 by #whitecatgrove

"I sing the prayers, you turn your face to me
night-eyed, ears fanned, and you listen. A stamp
for a stanza, your hoof against the earth,
regarding this strange phenomena:
a woman singing a prayer to you
as the oak leaves drift in their gentle rain.

My father shoots deer, stuffs the freezer
with them, my mother cooks them in a stew.
I sing to them and let them be, and so
we have a better relationship.
The turkey did a gentleman’s strut
outside the kitchen and I admired, charmed,

waiting for the butler to present
a calling card on a silver tray.
I eat flesh as health requires, but I don’t
gobble the world, I let the other be
offer up songs and an admiring eye.
Sometimes they sing back and stamp their feet."

PRIDES
#poem #political #story

Titania rises on her heels
claps her hands with glee
to see royal rangers clear the field
for her jamboree.
Her noble guests arrive at last.
Grand table’s set to break their fast.
Lavish feast for this ravenous class
to exalt their victory.
The royal band breaks out in waltz
for revelers’ employ.
Nary a note may ring out false.
We’re all here to enjoy
a raucous tribute to our fleet.
So raise your voices, stamp your feet,
privileged as renowned elite
to treat our vanquished as a toy.
To those who watch beyond closed gates
silly revelers at play
feeding the fire of long held hates
this is a different day.
“Fiddle dee dee” partiers bray with scorn,
mocking the starving and care worn.
But soon they’ll rue the day they’ve borne
as their world turns dank and grey.
As a new star ascends over fields and trails,
sparks audacious fete of change.

A QUIET IMAGE OF A BALLERINA DANCING IN STARLIT SPACE

Whatever excites me
inspires me
gives me energy
in exothermic reaction
Whatever captures my imagination
and won’t let go
Whatever the muses
joyfully bring me
dancing in graceful gesture
Whatever Goddess demands
haughtily
of co-creation
Whatever kicks me between the eyes
taking my breath
squeezing drops
of living blood
from my wildly
beating heart
Whatever calls to me
in ancient chants
of wisdom
So pure, so frighteningly intense
So fragrantly intoxicating
Whatever it is now my time
to become

#poem #inspiration

AFTER READING THAT MERRIAM-WEBSTER’S 2023 WORD OF THE YEAR IS AUTHENTICITY
by Dante Di Stefano

I wonder about the future poems
I will read, generated by AI,
the imperceptibly pixelated
tulips pushing through the rich soil in them,

the deepfake MFA bios attached
to them like deflated orange balloons,
the shining metaphors crowing from them
as I open the App of my eyelids

and scroll lithely from stanza to stanza.
I wonder if I’ll be able to notice
in their red wheelbarrows full of roses,
how a chatbot has damasked every stem.

I found the poem I’m writing now, tucked
in the galley of a tiny schooner
circumnavigating the four chambers
of my heart. It was wedged under a cask

of lime juice. It was written in the scrawl
of a mad captain hellbent on shipwreck
or treasure or unspecified glory.
It was found, it was wedged, it was written

to explain a flower growing in me,
a blue bonnet sprouting from my boot print,
gently stretching skyward to touch the stars,
but like all poems we humans fashion

from want and need and yes and must and what,
it ended up saying something else beyond
the arc of unsaying, something fevered
and cut, rizzed up against the scurvy dark.

—from Poets Respond

 https://www.rattle.com/after-reading-that-merriam-websters-2023-word-of-the-year-is-authentic-by-dante-di-stefano/

Dante Di Stefano: “Often lately, I have been teaching and reading and thinking about generative AI. Despite all I’ve read about Sam Altman, ChatGPT, etc., it’s hard for me to imagine how this technology will transform our world. Reading the article about Meriam-Webster’s word of the year further confirmed how enmeshed we are in this transformation already. Authenticity is a fraught term in poetry anyway, so I think this poem wandered into some of the fraughtness and complexity that comes with the terrain of lyric saying. For me this is less a poem about AI than it is a poem about the ancient technology of poetic utterance in all its mystery. The word rizz that I use at the end of the poem is an internet neologism added to Meriam-Webster this year, meaning ‘romantic charm or appeal.’”

#poem #poetry #literature

https://www.writtentales.com/open-submission-the-prompt/

#Submissions Open — WT #Chapbook Vol. XII

Theme to Use: Finding #Harmony
Form to use: short #story or #poem

Dec. 01, 2023 ~ Dec. 22, 2023

..."Through your words, guide us along your path to uncovering your steps to finding harmony. This is your chance to reveal how you navigate through life’s contrasts, forging a unique balance. Join us in crafting a collection that shares the beautiful dance of varied experiences on your personal quest for harmony.:...

Legends

I ride far upon a mare of the night
she of high fame and noble descent
snorting displeasure at my feeble attempt
to guide by the stars her unfettered flight.
We ventured to caverns lit by bright vermin.
We enjoyed the charm of enchanting seers.
I held the heart of folk I hold dear in a dream
carried lightly in my pocket, far yet too near,
for the fear came upon me
again and again that I might fail, might fall,
might show cracks of desperation
and who could love me now?
Who could find me bare and broken,
hear the words I could not speak,
recite the words that I must hear
to retrace, to find my place,
on back of a sacred mare,
back on my sacrificial journey?
Love becomes too great a luxury.
I must be free to name my price.
I travel the vast reaches of space for you.
I delve into my deepest pain to offer
painted posies, dripping in consecrated wine.
Where would I not rush in if I could blast the barriers
to bring your treasure, wrapped in shining glory?
Alas, Alack, these treasures I claim in your honor
are not those of your own demand.
Again I face you bent and bowed with empty hand.
I can not face such failure anymore.
We ride, I astride my plucky equine avatar.
She is, as it has turned, my only friend.
Our adventures become legion, become legend.
I’ll not be bringing home that story.

#poem #mythology

RISING NIGHT

Divine darkness.
Sparkling stars promise eternal light.
New days, new dawns, new destinations
open endless, unforeseen segues.
Wonder creates, merrily navigates veils
as each falls, cast away.
Luminous celestial array.
Lightning aurora bursts
expose prospective trails.
Breath of pine teases thought’s horizon.
Crackling branches carry fire’s
beckoning warmth.
Eventide soothing cup, succulent sup.
Ebb of anxiety. Ready to slumber.
Latent chant again and beyond and ever
peace, sacred peace.

#poem #peace

[...] Even trees understand me! Good heavens, I lie under them too, don’t I? I’m just like a pile of leaves.
However, I have never clogged myself with the praises of pastoral life, nor with nostalgia for an innocent past of perverted acts in pastures. No. One need never leave the confines of New York to get all the greenery one wishes—I can’t even enjoy a blade of grass unless I know there’s a subway handy, or a record store or some other sign that people do not altogether regret life. [...]

Frank O'Hara, "Meditations in an Emergency"

[...] Persino gli alberi mi capiscono! Santo cielo, mi sdraio sotto di loro, no? Sono proprio come un mucchio di foglie.
Comunque, non mi sono mai impantanato negli elogi della vita pastorale, tantomeno nella nostalgia di un innocente tempo andato fatto di atti perversi nei pascoli. No. Uno non ha bisogno di uscire dai confini di New York per avere tutto il verde che desidera - Non riesco a godermi neanche un filo d’erba se non so che c’è una metropolitana a portata di mano, o un negozio di dischi o qualche altro segno che la gente non rimpiange del tutto la vita.
[...]

#poetry #poem #ohara #translation #Italian #English #PastoralLife

Her Kind

https://theamericanscholar.org/her-kind-by-anne-sexton/?utm_source=email

#poem #poetry #literature

#POEM: I CAN’T BRING MYSELF TO MAKE COMMENTARY ON THIS YET
Posted on November 19, 2023 by whitecatgrove

"My cat scries the windowpane, shewstone
of wind-blown leaves, nut-hoarding chipmunks
as we parse the world for our pleasures
peeking around frames, behind ferns — lurking,
for abundance is so easily
startled, twitching its broad ears, its keen nose.

I know I should speak of the horrors
behind other panes, now cracked and empty
with rockets, bullets, grenades — even stones
when those run out, a flaming bottle.
What does this glass know but our cleverness
in killing? But tonight I’ll watch the cat
and see what he sees. Maybe it’s peace
lurking under those leaves. Maybe it’s hope
skittering into the falling shadows."

https://whitecatgrove.wordpress.com/2023/11/19/poem-i-cant-bring-myself-to-make-commentary-on-this-yet/

Tell It to the Birds
by Maya Jewell Zeller

I am sick
of not winning the National Poetry Series.
I am sick of waiting
for the mammogram, the ultrasound,
the appointment to discuss the results.
Tomorrow is the first day of school
in the year of our Lord 10x the number
of Covid cases as last fall
and no online options.
In the part of my mind I like to call
The Spite Museum,
I put each of my manuscripts in a different fairly ugly
dress and make a meme: 40 times a bridesmaid,
never a bride. But I always hated that saying.
Mostly because Never a Bride sounded thrilling,
I was killing it there in the Spite Museum
as I made one manuscript unwilling
to wear a dress, and one breast
missing. It went hiking.
When I had a child I named her life
and when I had another he almost died
but then lived so I named him for the echo
that falls down where once a river carved
stone so the walls carry sound. A good place
for a wail.
I am sick
possibly from the lump
but it may also be that this is the time my husband
of 22 years decided to tell me a string of lies.
I have been kind—his word—
and paying very close attention
like a wife or something
for a year and a half.
I understand irony. I hate ironing.
Once I, too, had other feelings.
I have tried to tone it down.
To come clean.

Yesterday I walked for two hours without stopping
and then I sat down in the water and cried.
A heron could care less.
An osprey stabbed a fish.

#poem #poetry #literature

https://electricliterature.com/three-poems-by-maya-jewell-zeller/

Honestly, I thought Turkeys could Fly
by Kenny A. Chaffin
All Rights Reserved © 2023 Kenny A. Chaffin

Rodrigo Wantanabe was his name
and he came to play.

With a steel rod and a mind like a tank.
Ideas always bubbling up to the surface.

Fluid flux, stellar detritus,
like sex, like the mind of God.

Kenny A. Chaffin – 11/14/2023

#poem #poetry #literature #mywork

Falling
by Kate Cayley

I was putting off God. A task crossed out
each night like laying aside clothing
I can't find time to repair.

My children speak to me from the next room
and I pursue their voices through the house.

I walk my son to the drugstore to buy hoops
for his ears. There's an old man in the doorway

and I give him less than I've spent on the earrings.
My son begins to walk home

in the opposite direction. He is old enough.
The man calls after me do not lose him.

When my son was three, the garbage truck driver tied
a loop of string to the handle of the truck's horn

and let him pull it. I don't know what to hope for
except that he will be blessed

with unnecessary kindness, offer it in kind.
He disappears at the corner.

I was still putting off God. The sky began
the ritual of evening and I walked
more quickly, refusing.

"Falling" is a poem about moral refusal, about how, in living, we defer our absolute responsibilities. It's easy to ponder loving your neighbour as yourself, and, in practice, almost impossible to achieve. I know abstractly that other lives weigh as much as my own, but I put off the full significance of this knowledge, as I put off the possibility of faith in my own life, because of what truly having faith would actually mean.

Kate Cayley on "Falling"

#poem #poetry #literature

https://mailchi.mp/poems/todays-poem-falling-kate-cayley-6078008?e=6ec42bce63

LOVE OF DISTANCE
by Prartho Sereno

He’s enchanted with the idea
of reaching through space,
wants me to wait by the window
while he climbs the far-off mountain,
sets up the light, flashes something back
in Morse code. He says we should begin
studying our dots and dashes, along with
smoke signals, the extravagantly long rolled r’s
of Spanish. Hand gestures of the deaf.

Or we could take the rim trail,
one of us staying on the southern lip
while the other heads north till our bodies
shrink to the size of tree-frogs. Then we can converse
across the canyon without effort, no need
to raise our voices. He is certain this will work,
that the atmosphere at these heights
will bear our words with a clarity
as yet unknown to us.

My faith in these things is weaker.
I dare not tell him the Far Eastern stories—
the one where the poet builds two houses
on opposite shores of the lake. Gives one
to his sweetheart, who he tells to go in,
take up dulcimer or needlework, learn to love
the lonely ways. Think of the surprise,
he says. One of our faces suddenly shining
between the black birds and reeds.

—from Rattle #27, Summer 2007

 
Prartho Sereno: “When I first read that so much depended on a red wheelbarrow beside the white chickens, I breathed a sigh of relief. My inner whisperer seemed to know this kind of thing, but I had always felt her murmurings to be of no use. Now I could scramble through an odd labyrinth of life-hoops—psychologist, cab driver, head cook, single parent, housecleaner, palmist, phys. ed teacher, Poet in the Schools—with someone I could trust inside. She’s the one who writes my poems.”

#poem #poetry #literature

A Massive Aquarium Holding 1,500 Tropical Fish Bursts
by Sarah Audsley

& each fish feels solid land before its gills
cease moving. I miss sex but can’t imagine

dating. Glass shatters in patterns designed
for a specific aftermath. What confession

offers isn’t relief. From my bed, coverlet tucked
under chin, I heard my father’s hand connect

with my mother’s cheek. A fish slap requires
actual fish-to-face contact. Windowpanes

bust in shards. Car windshields spider & smash
into square chunks or mini blocks, so on impact

they won’t decapitate or slash the face. A tank’s
ideal temperature for tropical fish is 75 to 80 degrees.

I tried to learn how to stab the worm on the hook
to bait the prey, but in the end I was only called

a pussy. Tackle box tipped over, the red & white
striped sleek lure. Don’t they think of everything:

claims to cover any minor loss, inspections to avert
damage. Even so, at the health center, the multiple-choice

form omits the oval to fill in adopted so I leave
the question blank. We’re here to consider my choices

in contraception, how to prevent an itchy rash down there
& to discuss the definitions of sex & life. What’s hereditary

gets lost to wonderland, elsewhere a consultant advises
curators on predation, tells the team which fish to import

for show-stopping colors & compatibility. But we know
the inspector misses the crack, walks by the leak, & finally

without pause someone sweeps & stuffs dozens of trash bags
with glass & dead fish parts. We want what we want.

#poem #poetry #literature
https://mailchi.mp/poets/november-14-2023-poemaday-12138304-331miebijr-12138452?e=2706955217

Graphic Novels

Each scar, an artwork.
Hopes etched on flesh; tragedies
scorched into psyche.

© Simon J Ashcroft, 2023

#haiku #poem #Poetry

Mock Orange
BY LOUISE GLÜCK

It is not the moon, I tell you.
It is these flowers
lighting the yard.

I hate them.
I hate them as I hate sex,
the man’s mouth
sealing my mouth, the man’s
paralyzing body—

and the cry that always escapes,
the low, humiliating
premise of union—

In my mind tonight
I hear the question and pursuing answer
fused in one sound
that mounts and mounts and then
is split into the old selves,
the tired antagonisms. Do you see?
We were made fools of.
And the scent of mock orange
drifts through the window.

How can I rest?
How can I be content
when there is still
that odor in the world?

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/49601/mock-orange?mc_cid=d5c91ac86c

#poem #poetry #literature

SACRIFARCE

What do we sacrifice?
Who do we put to the knife?
Ishmaels and Isaacs
innocent half-siblings
could be at puppy play,
achieve healthy bodies and confidence
in the rays of blessing.

What God is this?
What holy source of life
commands atrocity?
Oh, silly man.
Boys in battle,
regressed in tragedies
of childhood.
If the mentor class had flourished
we would be brothers building
cities of light,
gracious commerce,
glory of
love, honor, reason,
all the divine gifts
we profane,
we sacrifice
to a Lord of flies and
corpses.

#poem #antiwar

Walking with My Delaware Grandfather
BY DENISE LOW

Walking home I feel a presence following
and realize he is always there

that Native man with coal-black-hair who is
my grandfather. In my first memories

he is present, mostly wordless,
resident in the house where I was born.

My mother shows him the cleft in my chin
identical to his. I am swaddled

and blinking in the kitchen light. So
we are introduced. We never part.

Sometimes I forget he lodges in my house still
the bone-house where my heart beats.

I carry his mother’s framework
a sturdy structure. I learn his birthright.

I hear his mother’s teachings through
what my mother said of her:

She kept a pot of stew on the stove
all day for anyone to eat.

She never went to church but said
you could be a good person anyway.

She fed hoboes during the ‘30s,
her back porch a regular stop-over.

Every person has rights no matter
what color. Be respectful.

This son of hers, my grandfather,
still walks the streets with me.

Some twist of blood and heat still spark
across the time bridge. Here, listen:

Air draws through these lungs made from his.
His blood still pulses through this hand.

Denise Low, "Walking with My Delaware Grandfather" from Mélange Block. Copyright © 2014 by Denise Low. Reprinted by permission of Denise Low.
Source: Mélange Block ( Red Mountain Press, 2014 )
Please note: We strive to preserve the text formatting of poems over email, but certain email clients may distort how character indent, line wraps, and fonts appear.

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/57604/walking-with-my-delaware-grandfather

#poem #poetry #literature

NOT IN OUR NAME

Nobody wins in a war
(well, maybe a few financiers of war industries, but)
Not us, not them, not humanity
Not the dead, not the living
Not the yet to be born
Not the land, water, air, our natural resources
Not the roads, buildings, pipes, utility lines, the infrastructure
Not love or peace or morality
Not human nature
Not Right
Not Justice
Not God
Not the battlegrounds or the cemeteries, or the unhealable wounds in our souls
Whatever we may hope to accomplish with war,
There are better ways.

#poem #antiwar