December 7.21: Coping

Who said the moon is cheese?

Why, anyone can see

the moon is made of paper,

thick and cottony.

Someone tore it gently

in swooping deckled arc,

sculpting it to give me

a wink against the dark.

 

Dear reader,

This is not the perfect photo

about which I can boast;

the window I took aim through

added flourish of moon ghost.

But nighttime in the winter

I prefer being warm to bold;

it isn’t only dark out there,

it’s finger-nipping cold!

 

This is another one that, despite its length, makes me want to append “Burma-Shave!”

 

 

November 21.21: Coping

When winter moon laughs,

the sky shimmers

like sequined cloth,

and the trees reach

their paper leaves

to touch the spangles,

and the laughter bubbles

downward

to distant lacy roots.

And then one day

the tree,

filled with moon fizz,

explodes in green.

 

 

August 22.21: Coping

In the time of two breaths

there’s the twilight sweet spot

when everything hovers

between color and not.

White becomes silver

as shadows unfurl,

or maybe it’s pewter

or mother-of-pearl;

reds turn to velvet

with lavender nap,

blues, cupric sulfate,

with diamond wrap.

Yellows to brass

with gold overlays,

burnished in hot coal,

smoldering blaze.

And a palette is born

each day at its end

that no words can capture

but only pretend.

 

 

June 25.21: Coping

Every day

the sun gets old,

enfeebled, dwindling,

softens hold

and quits the world

with liquid light,

deferring to silver

suns of night.

 

 

April 25.21: Coping

One

pierces the twilight

with incorrigible song

defiant

in the face of night.

A ponderous tired sun

pauses

in stately descent

to anoint the singer

with gold.

 

March 29.21: Coping

How like Venus,

with wisp of night cloud,

twiggy veil,

rising, unbowed,

daring the eye to see,

the word to say

what some Olympus

has made of clay.

 

Did you see it, dear reader?

What a wonder!

January 30.21: Coping

Grandma’s kitchen clock

ticked crisply like a snare drum,

by day blended in the rhythm of work,

by night echoed

through the bedded house

while the rite of springs squeaked under me,

percussive, brassy,

objecting, it seemed,

to my child’s weight.

A bare light bulb

dangling on thick black cord

hovered

over the bed,

beyond my reach

even when I stood

jiggle-kneed

on the jello mattress.

Grandma reached up

and turned it off herself,

then slipper-padded out.

Her bedroom a whole dining room

and kitchen away,

sly-eyed shadows deepened

around me

in borrowed bed

where once my aunts were little girls.

In the sleep breath of her house,

Ivory soap.

Now, as COVID blurs days into nights,

and nights into days,

my clock ticks crisply like a snare drum.

 

 

January 6.21: Coping

Comes now night’s black broom,

sweeping citric glow

over earth’s long arc

into some tomorrow.

Two planets meet the while

in astronomical collusion,

appearing in a oneness

of ballyhooed illusion.

It isn’t the conjunction but

the difference that’s grand

between what we can see

and what we understand.

 

Thanks and congratulations on capturing the Conjunction to S.W. Berg.

My apologies, dear reader:

the Conjunction faded in the transfer

to my blog. I hope you can see it!

Although this post is coincidence,

I cannot help noting this is Little Christmas.

The tradition of the star may not be universal

but human searching surely is.

 

 

November 8.20: Coping

Moonpath,

silk road,

where some fragment of soul

follows the bright water,

trading calumny of day

for the horizon

of a lavender night

and pillow’d dreams.

 

 

With more thanks to photographer S.W. Berg,

and with wishes that my tired country

can find peace within itself.

 

October 4.20: Coping

If I breathe,

will I hurt the air,

will I break the moon,

shatter, tear

this moment

frail, silvern,

when crickets whisper

Chopin nocturne?