Choose love, lust like winter.

by Deena Tunstall 


 Never forget your worth.
 Don't give your time to someone who doesn't want you madly.
 Isn't excited to see you, every. single. time.
 First and last.
 You are intriguing and baffling in your own sense.
 You are like a puzzle, only certain pieces fit.
 Pieces that you have to find, try and test.
 Kiss only the lips that electrify you.
 Want the people that want you unconditionally
 and not just for now.
 Fall for the mind,
 it never changes.
 Feel honestly, sincerely.
 Act with the intentions in your heart,
 truly.
 As regardless of whether anyone finds out your indiscretions,
 you are still being judged.
 If not by others by yourself.
 Find beauty where it is never looked for.
 Be more than just a physicality,
 be a mindful entity.

  

 Deena Tunstall 

http://deenascribbles.wordpress.com/
 
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A Poor Boy’s Love Song

 
What does it mean to me
All the fine talk
Of tender lotus buds simmering gently
Or of steamed chili peppers
Opened to find their hidden seeds

When my garden lies fallow
In the drought’s sweltering heat
When my land is lost to power and to greed
When there are cesspools
At the end of my street

What to me are honey drenched dates
That drip in sweetness
From sugared moments
When my hope is choked in terror
Buried in the drifts of dust and sand
And the olive trees die

In the rage of war and hate

What to me
Is the taste of ripened pears
Laid bare by hungering shank
When the smug of self satisfaction
Wreaks in the hallowed halls of banks
And destroys the honesty of leaders
Who only use their power
For privilege and for rank

All my journeys end in alley ways
Scribbled corners
Graffitied walls
And the ruins of concrete

But come here anyway
Tell me that you love me
Tell me that you dream of me
Each night you fall asleep
Make this one moment’s lie
Sweet
Somehow make me want to be

c  5/21/13
Sandy Hartman

 So much turmoil in the world today.  It is time to write of one of the toughest issues that exists globally....unemployment and the lack of futures for so many young men. These youth will never reach their potential and we well never benefit from the loss of their talent and their work in our world. They hold our futures.  We will share their loss, no matter how indirectly.  What better calling for writers then to write of the great global issues that we as a people face.

If you wish to view the photos and slide shows as well as listen to the audio clip of this poem, you are invited to my web site at

www.eonwriter.com

Sandy Hartman

Sandy Hartman is a poet and blogger.
Member of www.NLAPW.org, Jacksonville chapter

From the Heart of my Heartland

JoAnna O'Keefe
joanna@joannaokeefe.com


"Live the life you've imagined"  -  Thoreau

The Suitcase

The Suitcase.
I beg that before you pack to leave,
You follow these instructions; please.
Place my passion in first,
Then place it under the pillow of your bed.
Wrap yourself in it when you are alone at night,
And let it lead you, to where it wants to be led.
Place my heart in the centre,
But keep it close to your own.
Don’t leave it on the journey
To die cruelly all alone.
Let my love be the last
That you fold carefully within.
When you arrive unleash it.
Wear it like perfume,
Clothing your skin.

Danny Kemp
http://theauthordannykemp.com/
Danny Kemp is a best-selling London based author whose thriller The Desolate Garden is being made into a 30 million $ film. He is also well-known to many of us from FB!

Freethought of the Day

Thomas Hobbes April 5 On this date in 1588, Thomas Hobbes was born prematurely  on "Good Friday" in England, his birth precipitated by his  mother's fear of the invasion of the Spanish Armada.  Thomas was the precocious son of a ne'er-do-well parson.  As a tutor, Hobbes made the "Grand Tour" of Europe three  times, once meeting Galileo. Contemporary  John Aubrey described Hobbes as "contemplative," and charitable, always carrying a pen and ink-horn in his cane,  with a notebook handy so he could jot down ideas during  daily constitutionals. Aubrey noted that Hobbes once wrote  a poem in Latin hexameter and pentameter "on the encroachments of the clergy on the civil power," which contained over 500 verses. De Cive was published in 1642, and Leviathan in 1651, in which Hobbes proposed the idea  that a "social contract" was necessary for civil peace. Its analysis of religion brought charges of atheism, then punishable by death. When things got too hot in England after Leviathan, Hobbes repaired to Paris. After the Great Plague in 1665 was followed by the Great Fire the next year, religionists sought a scapegoat. Parliament once more targeted Leviathan for being heresy. Hobbes hastily burned many of his papers. His writing helped give birth to the Enlightenment, by analyzing and questioning religious assumptions, and proposing that religion was created by humans. Hobbes attributed "opinion of ghosts, ignorance of second causes, devotion towards what men fear, and taking of things casual for prognostics, consisteth the natural seed of religion; which, by reason of the different fancies, judgements, and passions of several men, hath grown up into ceremonies so different that those which are used by one man are for the most part ridiculous to the other." Whether Deist, or covert atheist, Hobbes was anti-clerical, anti-Puritan and anti-Catholic, and managed to live out his full 91 years in perilous times due to influential friends. D. 1679. “Seeing there are no signs nor fruit of religion but in man only, there is no cause to doubt but that the seed of religion is also only in man. . .”  “Fear of power invisible, feigned by the mind or imagined from tales publicly allowed, RELIGION; not allowed, SUPERSTITION.”  “They that approve a private opinion, call it opinion; but they that mislike it, heresy; and yet heresy signifies no more than private opinion.” Compiled by Eleanor Wroblewski

Banking Day

It's banking day again
Mom's been planning this for a week
Time to get her big stash -  enough to last a month
She doesn't use credit cards
No way she's going to give some thief a chance to snatch her identity
Count on it!  Mom sticks to cash

In one hand, she has her Walgreens important papers wallet,
A little brown paper lunch bag,
And her detailed list of the cash she wants from the bank
            all small bills
            and an exact count of each
In her other hand is her trusty quad cane at the ready

When we arrive at the bank, I lag behind and wait in the back
Mom wants to make sure that I don't hover over her at the window
           and tell her what to do
She marches down the rich burgundy carpet precisely angling her quad cane
          guarded by the arched cathedral ceiling
          security police, and the nosey eyeballs of video cameras

She is impatient as she waits in line for the two customers ahead of her
          to finish their business
When, at last, she maneuvers her way to Grace's banking window
          two other available clerks are left waiting

Grace and Mom have known each other for nearly twenty-three years
Grace was Dad's favorite banking clerk
"She's all business,"  Dad would say

Mom launches into her well worn instructions     
Pointing precisely and reading aloud from her list
         the denominations and the number of  the bills she wants
Then she reminds Grace that they must be new bills
Grace smiles and gathers her familiar resources
A couple of customers now in line breathe deeply
        shuffle and shift to the other foot

Grace counts the stiff new bills twice into neat little piles
Mom methodically counts them again being careful to thumb each one thoroughly
        to make sure none are stuck together
Finally, she puts everything into her brown paper bag
All the while chatting about the robberies, scams on TV
       and the days when she and Dad would come to the bank together

At last, Mom turns, peers across the lobby's expanse
        and begins to pick her way in my direction
The customers in line exhale, change to the other foot and relax
She concentrates steadfastly on her trajectory
        brown paper bag and Walgreens wallet in hand
        confident that no one outside the bank will guess what's in them
When she finally joins me at the door
She stops, turns, glances back and flatly declares

       "They need more clerks in this bank
        I had to wait too long in that line
        Now, that's just plain poor management!”

c  9/07
Sandy Hartman

In Your Skin

There aren’t many times in my life

Where I’ve felt comfortable

Where I’ve felt welcome

I’ve spent most of it feeling horrible

Believing the poison people told me

I eventually started living as if it was true

I lost who I was in the pursuit of being their version of better

I held back my God given talents

Because they weren’t good enough

So I was told

Blocked out my instincts to live what I was told was the right way

I breathed in their toxic words

Trying hard to move past the suffocation

Mired in the quicksand

I couldn’t see past my desperate need to feel loved and wanted

To fit in

To make them all see

There was nothing wrong with me

I could be like them

I could be beautiful

I could be popular

I could be rich

I could say the right things

Wear the right clothes

I could be just like them

But I tried and failed

I was never meant to be anyone other than me

It took a blow to the head to realize this

To have the reality of who I truly am dawn on me

I finally saw how shallow they all were

How I was better off different

How I wasn’t the problem

My life is my own to live

My own to make

My heart is my own to please

And the sky’s the limit for me

I can rise above all they throw at me

I can be better than their best

I just have to choose what’s right for me

I have to live my life for me

I was created to be exactly who I am

I was never meant to be someone else

I was never meant to be like anything ever created

I was created unique and perfectly me

It’s a hard thing to realize

Sometimes hard to swallow

That fitting in isn’t a requirement for happiness

Fitting comfortably in one’s own skin is all that’s needed

Being happy with yourself

That’s all

Easier said than done

I’ve learned this the hard way

It’s easy to live their lie than your own truth

That’s what they want you to think

Honestly you can’t be anything other than yourself

You can’t fail at being you

It’s innately ingrained into your being

Every cell in your body

Every memory in your brain

And every spark in your soul

Everything that you love is purely you

Everything you say and do is all you

To be them is like wearing something several sizes too small

It just doesn’t fit

It won’t ever fit

But your own skin grows

Stretches and covers you comfortably

Holds you in place

Keeps you sane

Hugs you beautifully so

You don’t have to alter your own personality

You don’t have to cut and tear apart who you are to make it fit

It just simply does

It’s love of yourself that keeps it strong

Keeps it intact

Keeps it whole

It’s love of yourself that keeps your truth shinning

It’s always better to be yourself

It makes this world more colorful and beautiful

You make this world more beautiful

Just the way you are

Here is the link to my publisher's site where people can get a signed print
copy. They just have to leave a comment when purchasing that they want it
signed before shipping. :-)
©2012Simone Frances Reed

Artist with Newborn

 

Artist with Newborn

at her breast,  robe slips silk,

her shoulders, left arm cramps above

joint, as she nurses her son, 2 a.m. Floor

lamp  illuminates her,

she perches on a stool.

Face -to -faces her easel.

Right arm brushes, strokes, feathers, teases

paint, baby clutches. Nurture flows

through her. Color flows from her. Sleeve slips,

slides up muscled forearm, white wrist where

her watch band blocks sun's rays. Days she pushes

his stroller, he dozes, she dreams

of dancing.

Other breast peeks from robe

matches rhythm,  painting process,

she evokes a face from mystery,

until rainbow eyes gaze into hers.

Baby hiccups, his bare heel spasms,

smears paint, paper. She must relinquish

a brush to wipe his foot, his mark remains

on her painting (her heart) their composition.

She lifts him close with crooked elbow,  kisses

his tufted head.  She rocks  on her stool.

He sleeps against her shoulder. Drools

down her skin. She does not care.

She picks up the brush.

There is so

little

time.

Rachael Ikins

Http://www.rachaelikins.com

Artwork for sale at http://rachaelikins.com/artwork.htm

Publications, books for sale at http://rachaelikins.com/publications.htm

Ask The Girl Arts (@pet services) on FaceBook

Www.rachaelzikins.blogspot.com

Www.writerraebeth.wordpress.com

Twitter: @justaskrache

Http://about.me/Rachaelz

Member of NLAPW 

"Dwell in possibility and you will find magic"

LOVE’S FRAGRANCE

                                                             GIVING A HOOT  

Love is like a fragrant Rose
Whatever shape or form                            
As solid as the first new bud
In the light of perfect dawn
And when the morning takes its flight
As noontime sets the stage
This Rose unfolds its petals
On Nature’s scenic page
Then as the twilight lengthens
And darkness settles in
Its fragrance lingers in the air
To cheer our hearts again

By Jackie Hand in memory of her husband Berkley (6/11/12)
Member of NLAPW, Jacksonville, FL
Jackie has been a member of NLAPW since 1974. Jackie has won numerous awards in  her branch and in FSA for her music, poetry and short stories.Pen Woman of the Year  at the FSA 2003 Biennial Conference in 2003, and won First Place for the newly named Jacksonville Review newsletter. Two of her patriotic songs were recently used by National on two occasions, for the 200th Birthday Celebration of Abraham Lincoln 1809-2009.

Published on Front Page oft heir newsletter Giving a Hoot

Immune to Tragedies, Meandering between Jack-O-Lanterns

I am Severus Snape, the mysterious savior.
Only my eyes I have.
Only my eyes I can save….for now.
I go on stage soon.  Love me for however long I’m here.
Depression paralyzes the human spirit.  With time….I’m gone.
At forget-less thirty, I go to the ocean.
Jack-O-Lanterns, be no more.
I remember few girls, I remember many women.
I let them be.   I let them live without me.
I went on stage today.  Finished!  But you can’t teach the blues.
Lost trails are viral, both in my life and during passionate pursuits.
And now I’m sad because I’m leaving nothing but “alone.”
At forget-less thirty, I go to the ocean.
Jack-O-Lanterns, be no more.
Write these colors on my heart, which water washes away.
In denial of my rights to air, your smile brightens my day.
And I saw her in the audience today.  She, the color of purity.
I’m going insane, but it’s better than dying officially or internal.
So I’m medicated.  I believe in the heroic dolphins.
At forget-less thirty, I go to the ocean.
Jack-O-Lanterns, be no more.
And you said that intimacy wasn’t an option.
Like Riddle, my spirit was broken into seven.
Involuntarily, and each brake represents a murmur.
Every low point skips.  Cardiac arrest on the move.
The stage has vanished.  My fellow cast evolved separately.
I don’t know where life starts, and death ends.
At forget-less thirty, I go to the ocean.
Jack-O-Lanterns, be no more.
And I rose early today.  I’m sorry I did.
Last night, I rememorized memories miserably in mind.
I return to the stage next week.  I’ll finish strong.
And Papa, I’m sorry I didn’t listen….
Back when both eyes could gaze upon RADical hypocrisy.
I feel lost, because sorry doesn’t satisfy the apologies owed to many angels.
To Chelsea, Laura, and Ariel.  The first wave.
Kelsey, Chelsea, Summer, Eliya, Mary(s), and so on.
And Nicole, pretty angel, this line is for you.
“At forget-less thirty, I go to the ocean.
Jack-O-Lanterns, be no more.”
“Think of a memory, a very happy memory.”
And Remus Lupin is my definition for public education.
It’s three-thirty five, and the stage sets while anger rises.
For the Japanese Maples and Dogwoods wither in vain.
Space confuses me, and I wonder if Jah is flesh.
And witches are real.  They mock me from Thomas Leath and beyond.
Pumpkins ripen quickly in Dixie, that’s why horror is pre-carved.
I’m lonely for the haunted, so haunted, stop haunting me!
At forget-less thirty, I go to the ocean.
Jack-O-Lanterns, be no more.

Robert Alexander Deason          Peace

© All Rights Reserved

http://www.facebook.com/radisradicallyprimetime
http://twitter.com/#!/RADsPeace
http://trippydreamsandnegativenergy.blogspot.com/
http://www.youtube.com/longhairalex

Hair on the Walls

          Hair on the Walls
Jesus, where were you yesterday?
Where were you during the Holocaust?
I’m playing your character at Christmas.
You know, your birthday?
The day where everybody wants rather than needs
Are you Spanish?  I’m so confused.
Because I know a few Jesus’s from Mexico.
Hair on the walls….
An instantaneous discharge,
Purple cloth on the cross,
Blood in my eyes….Represents freedom
Jesus, did you forget to set the alarm?
Are you a deist?
Why does everybody believe King James?
Is it because you’re a monarch to?
I’ve been to church before.
And everybody accepts this version as fact.
Yet they despise Charles Darwin for being an individual.
It’s hypocritical.  They’re both theories.  So chill out!
Hair on the walls….
Represents frustration, an instantaneous discharge,
Purple cloth on the cross,
Blood in my eyes….Represents freedom
Jesus, I cried on my mom’s shoulder the other day.
It was nice, were you there?
Are you a pantheist?  I believe in prayer!
Jesus, what about Buddha, Mohammad, and Tom Cruise?
According to King James, they’ll all rot in hell!
That’s not fair!  I do care!
I swear to God I do care!
Hair on the walls….
An instantaneous discharge makes room for new friends.
If I ever had any old ones?
Purple cloth on the cross,
Blood in my eyes….Represents freedom
Jesus, it’s your time.
You know, magic, twirlified candy-canes, and one red nose.                                     
You know, overflowing stockings, beautiful colors outlined in white, good will, and peace?
Bullies are a bitch.
I wish real was real.
Business transactions are a bitch.
Hair on the walls….
An instantaneous discharge,
Purple cloth on the cross,
Blood in my eyes….Represents freedom
Jesus, my pictures lie.
Some people say that I’m like you.
And that’s true, to an extent.
Reflective glass reflects distorted images.
A broken heart creates a beautiful effigy.
Brain-dead, but my friends are here.
I looked inside you, and you, me.
Black and white, two polar opposites, it’s a shame.
Hair on the walls….
An instantaneous discharge,
Purple cloth on the cross,
Blood in my eyes….Represents freedom
Jesus, a poets mind, becomes kind with time.
T.D., C.B., and E.H., fuck their world, fuck a rhyme.
I wish there were more Hagrids’ in the world.
You know, real people with a warm soul?
I’m so pissed sometimes.  I mean, every now and then.
But mostly all the time.
In the shower, I see infant fossils.
I see hair on the walls….
An instantaneous discharge,
Purple cloth on the cross,
The blood in my eyes….Represents freedom
Robert Alexander Deason
© All Rights Reserved
http://www.facebook.com/radisradicallyprimetime
http://twitter.com/#!/RADsPeace
http://trippydreamsandnegativenergy.blogspot.com/
http://www.youtube.com/longhairalex

A BOWL OF PLUMS

                                               A BOWL OF PLUMS  
                          Painting by Jean-Baptiste Simeon Chardin, 1728;
                                     Poem by Salvatore Buttaci, 1994


Clarisse was not at the market this morning.
What made me think she would be?                                      
How many mornings have I walked the dog,
battled with him at the leash 
because it was not his usual route,
a neighborhood so unfamiliar as to frighten him?

Like the dog we are all habit's creatures:
we do what we know how, what we've done,
what we expect of ourselves, don't we?
It is when we find ourselves stranded
from our routines, in unfamiliar neighborhoods,
that we become fearful, our neat lives disheveled,
the schedule we follow suddenly failing us.

Clarisse was not at the market again this morning.
Pulling on his leash as if I had unintentionally strayed,
Roi strained his terrier head in the direction of home,
but I ignore him. Instead, I look from merchant to merchant:
the flower stand where you would bring home 
magenta freesias or pink canterbury bells 
so the flowers, you said, would have a good home;

the fish peddler, the wine dealer, the dairyman--
I cannot find Clarisse anywhere.
Still, each morning now for weeks, I return here,
afraid to lose hope, a slave to the old life.
  
One day she disappeared.
I repeat those words like a punish lesson
over and over again.
One day she disappeared.
One day she disappeared.


"I am not happy anymore," she said that morning
in a voice so sad it did not sound her own.
"Who is? I replied, making light of what I saw as light.
"Life's a struggle, isn't it?" I asked.  

Clarisse was not at the market this morning.
Roi is impatient: he has taken now to growling.
She may be gone but he is hungry, anxious to go home
where his food and water dishes will be filled for him
as they are filled every day. 
It is the way Roi expects things to be done.


At the fruit and vegetable stand visions flood my head.
Here where Clarisse and I gave our own names to the
apple, the orange, the potato--we gave them all names!
"A pound of Eves," she'd say for the apples,
"Two pounds of" this and that, which made us laugh
when the old woman asked us to point to what we wanted.

"Can I help you, Monsieur?" she asks me now.
"Yes, I am looking for Clarisse," I say to her.
"Clarisse?" she asks, reaching for the blackberries.
"These, Monsieur?  Clarisse. Let me see," she says,
then with her toothless smile she laughs.
"Of course, of course! These plums. These Clarisse!"
I do not have the heart to walk away
so I pay her for the bag of plums she hands to me.
"And your lady?" she asks. 
"Will she be baking you a plum pie today?"

                   #

The Dream

Last night we spoke                

of mangoes, pomegranates,

juice-drip, the many seeds.

Curled against my basket

your hot fruits nestle.

Your ribs’ shelf rests

my right hand,

its silver cherry.

I wake, your fingers

fluttering across my breast like

a flock of golden-eyed sparrows,

hungry for those tiny purple berries

I forget the name of them.

Rachael Ikinswww.rachaelikins.com

www.writerraebeth.wordpress.com

www.rachaelzikins.blogspot.com

Twitter @justaskrache

FaceBook Ask the Girl Arts

"Tell me what you plan to do with your one wild, precious life." Mary Oliver

"Godric's Hollow Meets Pine Island (Isolationism)"

                    

When I’m trapped inside Forever Eternal’s Canyon

And the ocean’s flesh salts my past, but dehydrates.

I float away, adorned with possessions, to where the chosen one lived.

As I lie pouting about mankind’s simplest obligations, I must compare and contrast.

For the vine replenishes regularly, and I must suffer a hemorrhage in accordance

(Isolation for the healthy.  Isolation for the sad.)

(Isolation for the lonely.  Isolation, the good’s gone bad.)

Lonely Room’s Corner to my right

Paid dues to my left, and good people everywhere

Faded bracelets, painted polygamy, Nicole’s long-lasting farewell. 

As I long for previous chances, the scarless doorstep remembers.

Pine Island, birth of memories, lady and a gentleman, fruitful, and they appreciate me. 

(Isolation for the weak.  Isolation for the strong.) 

(Isolation I must shriek.  Isolation, the right’s gone wrong.) 

Olivia, the red-headed, captivating swan. 

Innocent, but embedded in my dreams. 

Oh Julia!  The Japanese Maples and Dogwoods bloom involuntarily! 

I beg thee, I plead to thee, come to me. 

Rain down on me, come, breath, anew me.

As I rest in endless seas, coated with a bronze surface.

The cycle rotates, and I see a wall, covered with positive graffiti. 

Only it’s guarding a broken home. 

Pine Island is my will and the way. 

While enchanted lamp shades darken what could’ve been. 

(Isolation when I’m down.  Isolation when I’m up.)

(Isolation all around.  Isolation says I’m nuts.) 

Family by blood is stronger than a network, guaranteed.

Family networking, I’m not perfect, but Craig Caron is one sentence, and I’m a never-ending story. 

As I lie in a regretful state of mind

The purest definition of courage reveals itself.

While wrapped in swaddling clothes. 

Pine Island, Godric’s Hollow, one is dreamy, and one is home. 

I choose the romantic way, and a compromise. 

(Isolationism because I’m sad.  Isolationism because I’m glad.)

(Isolationism is to blame.  It isn’t, but ignites a flame.)

(Isolationism for growth, but I shrink, because of isolationism.)

(Isolationism is the end.  But it’s also the beginning, because I’m ending isolationism.) 

Someday……while

Peace is its name…..and

RAD is its master. 

Robert Alexander Deason         Peace

© All Rights Reserved

www.facebook.com/radisradicallyprimetime

http://twitter.com/#!/RADsPeace

March Brush Pick-up

For PMI

I drag bags of leaves,
pages of the book that told
last year's story, month by
month, day to day, the frost speckled
Spring nights, simmering summer solitudes,
a glass of wine and good company on front porch.

I drag them to the curb. A T-rex kind of truck
will rumble, growl tomorrow  this precious history
ground  into a  hopper,  pages
from other chapters, other
neighborhoods regurgitated
at the county mulch pile.

A body ambitious enough with containers
any size, and pitchfork, shovel, to load
mulch to carry back to fertilize, to feed,
Free, for a new year's garden. So many stories

intermingled.  It makes no sense. Maybe
an archaeologist would  know how
to read layers,  thickness and color;
could explain to the uninitiated what happened
a crime scene defined. The nostril-
stinging tang of rich rot floods the air.

I remember you, grown weak, small as a child,
urgent, afraid, body burned by radiation designed
to save your life, your bowels loosened from hacking
at the mulch mountain.  I said to you " No matter,
we, and everything about us, are washable."
How your light body hung, hitched, on my rigid hands
for steadiness. How heavy your shame.

As if this burning process, this essential weakness
of the cells that created the problem in the first place
should not have happened though this storyline
threads through all of us, runs through my head, sparked, no doubt,
by that fragrance of things rotting in peace. I release your arms
again and again in my dreams, but I cannot put you down.
It seems you find the crack in my sleep to slip in,
to remind me that once, years ago, you loved me
like no other.

I wonder if the winds will blow up
later, knock the bags over, strew the stories
over the pavement, down the streets until nobody,
especially not me, remembers any more.


Rachael Z. Ikins 
Artwork for sale at http://rachaelikins.com/artwork.htm
Publications, books for sale at http://rachaelikins.com/publications.htm
Ask The Girl Arts (@pet services) on FaceBook
Www.rachaelzikins.blogspot.com

Upon Sighting Snow Geese, Flight North

Storm peeled back night sky's
skin, a deeper, pewter hue. In the west
shade's drawn, but overhead reveals
a slice of silver moon, dangles one crystal
from her chin. Thin feathers of clouds
friable as tissue in wind's steel, flee.

Snow dervishes dance, sway as if house,
tree angers air. Overhead, indigo behind
shining sliver, where star's eyes peek through
night's torn fabric; I hear them:

Above the hiss of blizzard's retreat,  slow flow,
softer whispers from folds of cloud
tatters, two no, three pastel streaks, geese.

Not familiar birds in tux or tails,
these glow white as swans. Quiet voices.
Pairs fly onward. Above me, upside down,
my eyes, snow geese, a raft of them,
rows of rafts, ride rapids through heaven's
open gate. "My God!" I call, unbidden two words leave my lips,
smoke  air that rips them from me,"Oh, my God!"
I turn, I turn, a child on a merry-go-round, fingers reach for

glowing geese, moon dangle, the clouds, snow dervishes'
demented swirl, this February night. Tears frozen down
my cheeks, it is all God.

Rachael Z. Ikins
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