Sixfold Poetry Winter 2013 Read online

  the frogs were bragging, raucously,

  “Wedidit, wedidit, wedidit.”

  And three days later, the peepers joined,

  “Yousee, yousee, yousee.”

  Community

  The turkeys, who have been coming in small groups

  seem to have got together last night at a meeting

  thirty of them coming into the field this morning.

  Perhaps they were considering the weather

  light frosts two nights and today ninety degrees,

  and the dozen little ones.

  Who hatched these youngsters in late August

  they must have been asking, the answer

  plain to all of them and even to me

  who thought I could read embarrassment

  in the eyes of the fidgety hen and the blushing

  of an old Tom’s beard.

  When they hear the geese going over soon

  they might wonder about joining them

  nudged by a vestigial memory that hangs

  like a human coccyx or appendix

  with impulse to action, fit only for dreaming

  of perpetual summer.

  Rande Mack

  bear

  this man wears his shadow like a frumpy uniform

  his temper is dubious but he can’t put it down

  he walks into a bar and silence buys the first round

  it takes the toasts of strangers to divest his thirst

  the stains on his shirt are the medals on his chest

  the moon pulls his bravado around by its nose

  he smells sweat slippery between breasts

  he smells dew beading on wild strawberries

  he fords rapids running through raging hearts

  his passion insatiably pirouettes in the mirror

  his spectacles are fly specked and tinted with fog

  what he sees in front of him is not always there

  his appetite leads him through a gluttonous waltz

  he winks at the future as he dances with the past

  the toes he steps on limp away from the brawl

  his mother once tangoed time out the door

  he keeps her estate in the heel of his shoe

  clocks pick his pockets when he falls to the floor

  bat

  this man clings to the underside of over

  he signs his name to documents that won’t rhyme

  he paints his mailbox with mustard and guano

  he plays the radio his mother kept in her kitchen

  in the winter he fine tunes crackling frequencies

  searching late night static for a taste of hum

  his frost bit ears gather the cloudy music of tiny wings

  he once danced in starlight with hungry zigzagging women

  now his stomach growls as he swerves to avoid the downbeat

  this man sprinkles mosquitoes on short ribs and omelets

  he inoculates his memories with mother’s milk and rabies

  his great uncles sipped the blood of slumbering giants

  on whetstones of dragonfly bones he sharpens his teeth

  he squints as the moon blooms in fragrant dark corners

  he sniffs gasping blossoms he finds quivering in shadows

  his dreams are upsidedown and cratered with echoes

  the mirrors in his heart are turned towards the wall

  he fondles the what ifs of what must be abandoned

  marmot

  this man is mangled by sawblades of sleep

  he wakes up counting his fingers and toes

  spotlights fracture the gnarled grain of his dreams

  this man is puzzled by the jazz of his own charisma

  hope is measured by the length of his shadow

  his dreams are branches that won’t fit in the stove

  he keeps a portrait of the moon next to his pillow

  minutia nibbles on the varnish of his pseudonym

  his handshake is a cage in the middle of a smile

  laughter is a mirror he shines in curious faces

  the shine on his shoes belonged to his father

  meaty ledgers were balanced and waiting

  he lives in a maze with maps on the walls

  he tips the doorman but whistles for the waiter

  hunger is an ancient voice in destiny’s choir

  his harmonies are stumps on the forested edge

  his heart is a blackbird in a frost stippled tree

  his fate a tarnished spoon sprinkling his ashes

  magpie

  this man takes out the trash in his tuxedo

  he reeks of roadkill he powders his crotch

  he sharpens his creases he slicks back his hair

  he struts through the hush like he owns all the vowels

  he jaywalks with a flair through rush hour traffic

  he could get smeared without ruffling a feather

  he is a matador sidestepping wheels in a jammed up dream

  he is the only son of a sleepwalker and a pilot car driver

  at the end of the road a sliver of moon stabbed his mama’s heart

  his heart is an old valley slowly choking with intersections

  his lovers with their mysteries and mirrors are good for a laugh

  his syllables are waves of glass shattering on shores of stone

  he is the sergeant of arms in a cathedral of criminal minds

  he likes soda in his scotch and his eggs just about to hatch

  when shadows steal the day misfortune cues his favorite tune

  all his cards are on the table . . . face down but on the table

  he has no name for the silence slowing upping the ante

  nor for the drumroll about to goosebump his soul

  Susan Marie Powers

  Red Bird

  Snow swells over fence posts,

  drapes pine branches and softens

  the edge of an ax

  propped against a stump.

  Once a plane crash survivor,

  arms folded, quietly told me

  how the engine died, the soft screams grew,

  and cups flew amid staccato cries of “no.”

  Then the memory falls away

  and a cardinal, red as blood,

  beats wings against the snow,

  lands on the stump.

  I close my eyes but the rays

  come through my closed lids.

  Red wings sparkle in the sun.

  I remember my old dog dying in my arms,

  unable to walk, folded legs limp in my lap.

  The needle glistened as the vet’s eyes watered,

  I held my dog, stroked the warm ear.

  Snow softens all it touches.

  Numbing, hiding, icing over

  the way I loved a man long ago.

  Now days go by without thoughts of him,

  yet shadows chase me when I see another man

  with his hands: clean and strong.

  I have felt life tingle inside me,

  and then it bled away.

  I cried, unable to stop the loss

  of someone who never was.

  The cardinal launches into the air,

  his red heat burns brightly.

  The survivor found herself

  holding hands with strangers.

  Everybody aboard touched:

  lovers, strangers, children.

  Eyes closed, fingers entwined,

  ending life as they had begun it:

  absorbing the warmth of another.

  The red bird darts looking

  for what it wants.

  I stand in the snow while somewhere

  smoking fragments burn my feet,

  feathers touch me, wings graze me.

  I wait for the blade

  to cut me;

  I wait to fall

  into space.

  Moored

  Every moored boat tugs at its tether,

  small waves disappear into larger o
nes.

  The dock reaches out, but can’t cross the sea.

  I stand on the shore and squint at impossible distance.

  When I was a girl of fifteen,

  I tied our small sailboat to the dock.

  The boat’s bright yellow reflected in the water,

  The rope was too short to secure

  both ends, so I left it:

  tethered at one end, loose at the other

  The next morning, I arose to sun on my ceiling,

  a pattern of light, bouncing off the water

  beneath my bedroom window—squiggles and whorls

  played off the painted surface

  like soundless music.

  Easy, the golden day ahead,

  I walked outside where I found

  the boat battered into splintered boards.

  A nighttime storm had set it into motion

  so it cracked itself in two.

  Now I watch boats calm and controlled,

  and wonder about a rhythm so violent

  my very structure would come undone,

  shaking apart everything put so carefully into place,

  the wildness more powerful than the bond,

  the waves overwhelming the vessel.

  Can I go back in time to my fifteen-year-old self?

  Secure the boat to resist the storm?

  Defy waves struggling to undo knots?

  Or do knots come undone

  as time nimbly unties us from what we love?

  Now, with decades behind me,

  I send a benediction to that sleeping girl,

  who cannot foresee what the night will bring.

  Happy Buddha

  A stone Buddha in Provincetown

  squats among singing lilies and gladioli.

  Their summer voices blare orange pastels

  in loud speaker fashion.

  Buddha, how do you resist the urge

  to swing your plump hips to this sunny blast of colors?

  Surely, you must rise from that lotus position

  and belly dance among the cone flowers:

  your lovely round tummy smoothly

  undulating in the afternoon sun.

  The roses twining the fence

  beg you for a kiss.

  Maybe a tango would do as you pull their

  vines hither and yon.

  And before you foxtrot back to your spot,

  take me in your arms for a sexy waltz.

  Look deeply into my eyes,

  and I will sigh as you

  pirouette into place,

  already missing your strong arms.

  Anne Graue

  Sky

  We were always looking up

  in spring; those months so

  hot and cold anything could happen;

  funnels dropped, vanished,

  vacuumed up between the clouds.

  The Midwest sky turned

  jaundiced and still.

  Oklahoma knew it was coming:

  the cliché of the freight train,

  the stillness,

  the mass of moving earth.

  This time, the myth would shred

  the houses to toothpicks

  scatter photographs

  and houses like paper shells.

  In Kansas, tornado

  drills were routine;

  I thought we would outlive

  whatever hit us; our heads

  down, legs cramped, breath

  hot above our folded laps.

  Carrying my blanket

  down under the stairs, my

  father’s shortwave crackling

  weather reports,

  I knew I would not survive

  when the tornado hit

  our house. Living would be

  too difficult, as the living always is.

  Her Letter to Kurt Vonnegut, 1982

  There’s a place in Kansas City

  called Montana Wildhack’s;

  I thought we might meet for a drink

  and talk about Cat’s Cradle or

  Slaughterhouse Five. It would be

  nice, nice, very nice.

  My sister knows the place.

  It isn’t a gay bar, really, but

  she might have kept that secret

  (she is so used to keeping that

  secret); she just likes the name,

  I think, and said she’d take me.

  I think you write like you know

  all too well how humans behave—

  the writing is spiritual,

  tough, real. (Too much?)

  My sister hasn’t read a word

  of it, and probably won’t; it’s

  not her thing. She leaves reading

  to me except for Anais Nin

  or the author of 9 1/2 Weeks;

  The books were in her room

  and she was out.

  Earthly conversation

  would suffice, not be

  the end of the world,

  frosty and nuclear—

  so it goes.

  She told me she was in love

  with a woman one night

  in an old pickup we hot-wired.

  At her friend’s house with a pool

  late at night, we drank beer

  and swam above the Playboy

  logo, down and back and down.

  I am sure this type of thing

  has happened, more or less; this

  may be one of the good times

  we concentrate on, ignoring

  awful ones. I hope you will

  consider meeting me

  the next time you’re in Kansas City.

  Cycles

  Spring hot, yet

  it feels like fall—

  through weak bones

  through clotted skin

  thickened and congealed—

  jaundiced spring and wild

  ochre seep through

  flaming bramble; bruised

  plum of laden hyacinth,

  the cadaver of a grey mouse,

  the pinched ruby of a tree

  growing, leaning toward pale

  summer petals of a shrub flowering

  in bells that hang low, look

  as if they might reach

  for furry mustard & black

  pepper with wings—

  translucent and spinning—

  winter insinuating.

  Mariah Blankenship

  Tub Restoration

  My father says I restored this 77-year-old tub

  to feel like Cleopatra but I only wanted escape

  from cybernetic ecology, wanted to feel

  cast iron cool on my back in the winter

  and I didn’t feel like a prince-ss or an Egyptian goddess

  in this tub because I spent hours whittling it away.

  I dumped it like my own crusted memories

  on the cracked concrete driveway, mask allowing

  me to breathe nothing from the past

  that I am sanding away like corroding bones,

  77 years of memories echoing from the drone

  of a sander. It took four hours to strip the tub

  clean of its memories, to peel the now elderly children’s

  fingertips from the sides where they bathed

  in democracy, capitalist rubber duck trying to stay afloat

  while Roosevelt speaks on the radio and a Declaration

  of War floats in the air pulled by little atomies

  while Queen Mab is in a hazelnut flying

  through men’s noses while they sleep.

  Memories are dissipating and lost in the atmosphere

  of a belt sander with each medium grade discard,

  each rectangle tossed into the trash,

  nationalism in a hefty bag, and surely the coming

  and going of women (talking of Michelangelo or

  Kennedy or King) was lost in the friction as well

  a
nd I can almost see one whispering Free at last

  Thank God Almighty we are free at last and perhaps

  the mothers memorized the ceiling above the tub

  while their children slept, while their husbands slept

  like dolls. When I finished sanding, I painted the raw canvas

  (flushed of memories, history floating through the

  atmosphere) with a porcelain white and now I soak

  like a working class Cleopatra in a memory pond,

  pruning away in the dull dust of humanity.

  Utopia on a Park Bench

  An old man wrinkled with time,

  wrinkled with so many days at

  Goodyear Tire, constructing tires

  in an assembly line, tire population

  in the thousands, communists

  on a conveyer belt, arms forcefully

  pointed upward. His park bench

  is vast like a continent.

  He, like Chagall’s wife, corner of a canvas,

  consumes just a fraction of the wood

  and metal conglomerate, and he

  is feeding the birds, feeding the birds

  as God, government of birds competing

  for each seed like capitalism in a park

  with leaping birds, working class birds,

  open leaves in the open air of every

  season of every year. Equal amounts

  of seed pour onto the ground and he

  knows there is no solution to equalize

  their earnings, to balance the scale

  with Marx perched in the middle as a raven.

  He knows no socialist solution in his

  steel-toed boots and windbreaker

  with his beard growing downward

  like the droppings of his tears to paper bag.

  He knows no solution, only that he

  is a giving tree in a dystopian world

  and he tried to throw a pile here,

  a pile there, one for you, one for you,

  but the birds, the birds worked for their

  profit, while the man, like God, fed them.

  And Violets Are Blue

  I am tired of submitting to journals,

  society, men, God, tired of watching

  my dog cower under my desk

  after pissing on the floor.

  I am his god after all, and he

  is tired of submitting to me,