Category Archives: poetry

Posted on by
Reply

(for lack of anything else to say, I’m posting here a poem a day….)

That first winter
(our strange shrimp-shaped child),
locked into the old railroad apartment
(our brassy new marriage keys) —
with the snow seeping through
the chipped bathroom bricks,
I nursed that child
before the open oven,
and we each took showers
with bathroom door hopefully open
to the kitchen’s meager warmth.

Our imaginative landlord
(poet-pretender,
great making of Christmas plum pudding)
attached an infra-red lamp
to the toilet,
mistakenly assuming
that plumbing, like flesh,
would succumb to its magic.

We could afford to laugh,
then, shivering
behind the radiant lie
that lined the loose edges
of the closed bathroom door.

I still feel the cold
of that first winter,
the cold of that closed door.
Cold as hell.

c elf 1960s

Roots and Wings

Posted on by
1

(for lack of anything else to say, I’m posting here a poem a day)

I asked my mother to give me roots.
She smiled and left the cord uncut,
its far end snaking through
a lineage of cords untouched.
I clawed against its tether,
searching desperately for swords.

I asked my father to give me wings.
He stood away,
arms pressed heavy to his sides.
“Fly, fly!” his strained voice cried.
I raised my naked arms
and walked into the wind.

I asked my husband to share
with me the things he knew
of roots and wings.
He showed me scars
where his own still pressed
from deep below old broken skin.
I stumbled away,
a stolen blade tucked in my boot.

I asked my lover to show me
what he thought of roots and wings.
He climbed upon a fence
and sat away the days.

So I called the stones
to coil at my feet,
sharpened my blade to womansword,
and carved a path that spiraled
through a horizontal rain.

And the roots became wings.
And the wings became roots.

And now I flow among the sands,
cold and knowing;
I rise, unbridled,
light among the dust.

c elf 1980s

winding sheet

Posted on by
1

(for lack of anything else to say, I’m posting here a poem a day)

I wake
tight
wound in the sheet
–night winding sheet —
wounded
in the tight lined
yellow-sheet logic
of your wound mind
winding
sheet-tight
around my night.

c elf 1970s

Manchester, Massachusetts

Posted on by
1

(for lack of anything else to say, I’m posting here a poem a day)

Resting on a quiet ledge
on the beach at Manchester,
the sun warming all of my ends
and endings,
I am drawn to these granite reaches
of the gray North Shore —
the icy sea
an eternal challenge
to the persistent sun
that beats
and strokes
and licks summer heat
into the abiding stones
that wait, still and silent
against the stark abuse
of a relentless surf.

c elf 1980s

Two for the Road

Posted on by
Reply

((For lack of anything else to say, I’m posting here a poem a day….)

Her Daughter’s Destiny

If she mirrored me
she refused to know it,
choosing, instead,
the finer lines
of her father’s reflection.

There were times
I wished her gone,
her and her herd
of fragile unicorns –
or cornered where
I couldn’t watch
their golden dances
filling the space in my mirror.

When she left that spring,
the corners grew shadows.
She set free the unicorns
and took all of my mirrors
with her.

……….

Her Son Leaving Home

Young Dionysus,
a faded blue bandana
circling his head like a halo,
layers himself with choices
forgotten by the gods.
He smells of earth, of dreams,
of rain that flows with ease
along acres of hilly woodland,
filing some final need
in the deep hollows of stones.

He releases himself to the magic of motley,
to the wind, alive in his unbound hair,
to sweet pickings, scattered
like ripening berries
along miles of roadside vines.

As he leaves, the hearthfire
crackles softly.
Blackbirds loose feathers
from the heights of sky-borne oaks,
and honey bees sing to the sun.

c elf (1970s and 1980s)

Ode to Opal

Posted on by
1

(For lack of anything else to say, I’m posting here a poem a day….)

Ode to Opal

The opal, they say,
scatters the heat of the wearer,
turns her fickle, they say
(if she is not centered)
– like light in moving water,
like water on warm stone.

(Let her who wears it
beware.)

The opal, they say,
is partly water,
softer than crystal
(though not as clear),
smoother than pearl
(though not as soft),
as fragile as a heart
nearly mended.

Break it and it bleeds —
water scattering light
like dreams at dawn.

(Let him who holds it
beware.)

The opal, the say,
attracts joy, love,
creative spirits
that fire the heart,
sends from its center
the magic of all other stones,
– an irresistible call
to iridescence.

1992 c elf

rebirth is a struggle

Posted on by
2

Spring. And rain. And in my deepest being a reflection of what’s happening in the deeper earth. I’m struggling.

And so I go back into my stacks of poetry, looking to remember who I’ve been as a way of beginning to find who I am becoming. Age 71. Still becoming. Spring, again.

For lack of anything else to say
I’m posting here a poem a day,
Most are old and conjure years
rife with hopes and dreams and fears.
Rippling through my flow of time,
they maybe sing, but never rhyme.
Perhaps someday they’ll fill a book.
If not, it’s just some chance I took.

A poem from my 30th year:

Riding the Heartland Current

When the sun finally slips
through the clouds
spilling into that lake
in high Wyoming,
it is only a matter of time before
the muddy waters reach Montana,
where the Missouri gorges itself
on the Jefferson, Calatin, and Madison,
binding its fate to the press
of a season’s passion.

Along the banks at Bismarck,
Spring becomes a time for waiting.
And even at bold St Louis,
bright fishing boats
hold to their moorings,
sheltered from the sudden currents
that rush Spring’s murky dreams
toward the hungry Mississippi.

It is never wise
to swim the dark Missouri;
As everyone in Nebraska knows
the mud must run its course
through each Missouri Spring.

1970 elf

she might

Posted on by
6

The following is my response to the visual writing prompt at Magpie Tales #59. Go to the site to find the responses of other writers.


she might really be him, you know,
that quirky painter who so loved codes
that he scratched subtle signs
behind and under what you see
so that you can’t see what he really
means unless you look too close,
and, even then, no one knows if
that’s what he meant or if he just
liked to play in a wig and snide smile.