RE / VERSE Fourth Anniversary Post: BLUE IS A FUGITIVE COLOR

photoart: sharon auberle

BLUE IS A FUGITIVE COLOR

by Sharon Auberle

It is the color of ambiguous depth,

of the heavens and of the abyss at once…

            ~  Alexander Theroux

Do you remember that night

I said I would have to leave?

Under a blue moon

in Clem & Ursie's Bar

you asked would I walk toward

something      or away

           

            and I said a horizon

is what I need, 

a road rising to meet me.   

Dante's 9th Circle of Hell isn't fire

but ice     

           

            yet blue light

has the energy to escape ice

and remain visible.

            Too often invisible to you I became     

           

                        blue

is a fugitive color  

fades quicker than any other.

~ first published in Peninsula Pulse

Seeing Mountains

photo: sharon auberle

by M.J. Iuppa

Seeing Mountains

in shades of amber, an ecology of ash

& aspens, their expansive reach to a cloud

chasing sky casts a spell  over me . . .

                                              

 I look up into heights I rarely perceive

from a farm whose land was once smoothed

by the press of a glacier’s hand.

                                                      And so, I slide

into the pool of my shadow & sit there quietly

waiting for the windless explosion of monarch

wings or a thousand  leaves  tumbling like loose

coins tossed into autumn’s sunlight to take

 my breath away.

~ first published in Blue Heron Review

Woman . . . Man . . . Fish . . . Bicycle

photoart: sharon auberle

Woman…Man…Fish...Bicycle

by Sylvia Cavanaugh

Perfectly round ova

nested within

were formed along with the rest of the body

in the shelter of a mother’s space

from her own singular orb

round eggs round the chain of

life it clicks along

propels a forward tide

while men burrow down in furrows of

clone technologies make their

swimming cells redundant

whiplash tails

accidents of evolution

all come down to our bodies

our brains

and our inventions

like this red and gleaming two-wheeled frame

perfect fit between two legs

propulsion honed to hip and knee

press of foot and ankle flex

thumb and bell cry

we are coming

we are coming

self-satisfied we

cruise a moist planet

her many trails

~ first published in The Camel Saloon

ANNA SWIR IS MISSING . . .

photoart: sharon auberle

ANNA SWIR IS MISSING IN THE FOREST

by Sharon Auberle

Last seen lying on a log

among trilliums, lady's slippers

and columbine…

It has rained since then,

a downpour of sweetness

drenching the book

I left among trees

where birds and squirrels

may one day line their nests

with a poet's words.

I didn't mean to leave her there,

but knelt to gather mushrooms

then, forgetting, walked away.

As she lay dying in Poland,

Anna wrote the book's last poem,

hospital sheets white and sterile

beneath her, no bed

of dark loam and leaves

no choirs of wildflowers

no one to whisper

she did not die,

she's only gone missing

for awhile in the forest.

~ first published in Crow Ink (Little Eagle Press)

Editor’s note:  Some days after losing the book and gaining this poem, Ms. Auberle retraced her steps through the woodlands and recovered the volume, dampish and lovely and treasured more than ever.

Metronome

photoart: sharon auberle

Metronome

by Harvey O’Leary

To wake, as if given a fright,

To know today has no tonight,

To watch a cord dangle the light;

To watch the watch, to clock the clock,

To hear, as the key fits the lock,

The tinnitus of tick and tock

Grow louder; to hear the heart boom,

To see the door enter the room,

To know that now the time has come.

~  first appeared in Verse Virtual

First Tulip

digital photoart: sharon auberle

First Tulip

by Donal Mahoney

Sometimes you sit for days

sucking yourself in 

praying the right words

will fall in your ear

toboggan over the whorls

pierce the canal

and settle in your brain

an embryonic delight.

Sometimes you sit for days

and finally the words come

and they're always a surprise

like the first tulip in April

or a sudden

orgasm for your wife.

~ previously published in The Citron Review

Hot Flash

artwork: sharon auberle

Hot Flash

by Sylvia Cavanaugh

To forge weapons

with fire

is a sign that we are civilized

but the taste of knowledge

had its price

dealt in a currency

of fertility

in calendar clicks of counted days

a real blood bargain

paid periodically

paid in labor pains and

in pre-menstrual syndromes

but now I wield

my own damned fire

to cauterize the wound

the first sin settled up

my womb

now sweated caustic clean

Adam’s bones are mine

and he is scorched

turning on these embers

he re-arranges and adjusts

looks at me

across his stiff

cold shoulder

and winks

~ first published in Red Cedar 

Book of Synonyms, p. 997

photoart: sharon auberle

Book of Synonyms, p. 997

by Jeanie Tomasko

valentine, n. 1. This morning when the cardinal

broke my sleep, I started thinking Corvette, 

cherries, Russian Revolution. 2. This morning

when the cardinal sang on, I thought of beets

and roses and relentless. 3. This morning

when the cardinal wouldn’t stop, I said out loud

I want to be reckless with desire. 4. I decided

not to spend the day cutting hearts out of paper

to spread here on your pillow. 5. Love,

instead I am going to fledge a thousand

cabernet-colored feathers to cover my own

small beating heart. 6. It’s the middle of winter,

who cares if we don’t last the night?

~ previously published in Sharp as Want

   (Little Eagle Press)   

WITH THE WINDOW OPEN

photoart: sharon auberle

WITH THE WINDOW OPEN

by Ronald Baatz

With the window open

you can hear piano music

softly coming from the house

like bread thrown to birds.

The night is calm, except for

some bright thunder that

accompanies the falling leaves.

Part of the mountain ash tree

is dead, though the music she plays

may turn it into firewood.

I could hide in the dark

of the barn, to rip the

skin from my thumbs.

The place is no longer used,

but then neither is the north star.

The situation surprises me,

as does a dream.

My blood has turned to ashes,

caught in a woman’s long hair

like confetti or dried

and broken leaves.

~ first published in Shenandoah (1974)

Lists, Early July

photo: sharon auberle

Lists, Early July

by Jeanie Tomasko 

1. Four-something in the morning and the cardinal is at it again.

2. I want to walk, don’t want to wake you.

3. I want to hear the wood thrush sing.

4. From some sound sleep, you’re up, don’t want me to walk alone

because of my new medicine.

5. Six crows are, well, singing.

6. Peewee, chickadee, song sparrow.

7. Yarrow, wild roses, the early white of baptisia on the prairie.

8. Twenty-eight catbirds imitating the thrush.

9. Hardware aisle, yesterday, kitchen knobs by the thousands:

smooth, silver, tarnished, porcelain, rubbed, studded ...

10. In my pocket, the one I needed to match.

11. The wood thrush flies from Guatemala, every spring, exactly

to this dead oak to sing summer.

12. The sun is up now, mist rising from the creek.

13. What I mean is,

14. Can you sometimes know, exactly

~ first published in The Midwest Quarterly   

On St. Patrick's Day . . .

photo: sharon auberle

On St. Patrick’s Day, a True Confession

by Marilyn L. Taylor

Oh Lord, how I’d love to be Irish!

The Irish are nothing but hot,

and they’ve gotten incredibly stylish—

but Irish is what I am not.

My name doesn’t translate to Irish,

nor start with a “Mc” or an “O”,

so no matter how Molly Maguire-ish

I’m feeling, it’s hopeless, I know.

But I’m dying to fib just a little

for maybe a day or a week,

and pound the bodhran, play the fiddle,

and break into brogue when I speak;

I’d tipple with Nuala and Dylan,

I’d blather with Eamon and Shaun,

and then (if the spirit is willin’)

go guzzle more Guinness till dawn!

Of course it’s a little bit sneaky;

in fact, I would feel like a dork

neglecting to mention Milwaukee,

pretending that I was from Cork—

But Lord, how I’d love to be Irish,

be one of those glamorous Celts—

now that everything Emerald Isle-ish

Is cooler than anything else!

~ first published in the Irish American Post

On Not Knowing

photo: sharon auberle

On Not Knowing

by Jeffrey Johannes

When I was young, I watched

a Chinese monk brush characters

of red lacquer on a door

the color of spoiled plums;

no matter what his message,

I felt the impatience of not knowing

and something changed in my heart.

And here lies the struggle,

the uncertainty in wondering

if there is anything

more certain than losing my hat

when I leaned into sunset

sighting a humpback whale,

the weight of its bones

bearing hard to lee,

stunning in aptitude and joy,

its molecules speaking a language

I did not understand.

~ first published in Nimrod

photo:sharon auberle

DESTINATION

by Cathryn Cofell

In my fantasy: 

Tuesday afternoon,

blinds drawn, covers kicked

to the floor, you and I

slick with sweat and oil,

bodies tight as earth and root.

I write secret words

on the sole of your left foot:

flame and temple and tether,

your hurricane face washed in genius,

your eyes wild on me,

your red, red lips on

the answers I long to hear.

In your fantasy:

morning birds peck

in an empty bath outside,

blinds wide open,

kitchen table, papers raked

to the floor, you and I

tumbling like rusty locks.

Words grind in your head:

flash and peacock and passport,

still fall into lines of pure genius

even as we steam the windows,

even as you bathe my long

pale body with lamplight and seed.

~ poem previously appeared in Sweet Curdle (Marsh River Editions)
   photo, in EVErywoman (Seven Islands Press)

Walking Near a Frozen Lake

photo: sharon auberle

Walking Near a Frozen Lake

by Jeanie Tomasko

There is no stillness anywhere

but in death and even then

how would I know

I didn’t even know until now

my heart was a muscle of water

under ice

~ photo and poem previously published

   in Sharp as Want (Little Eagle Press)

Something for the Journey

photoart: sharon auberle

Something for the Journey

by Alice D’Alessio

Suppose, for instance,

this is the last morning.  You never know.

You wake to find a wet snow

has sneaked in after midnight

wrapping the branches

with an airy gauze, spangled with diamonds

so that every snarly twig and tendril

is an epiphany of white

etched against the purple-blue

of an undecided sky.

And you want to be sure to seize it,

store it in scented linens,

in carved and gilded coffers

along with last May’s poppies,

August sunlight spilling its motes and spores

among the pines and sandstone cliffs,

and a copy of your only perfect poem.

Because we must take something with us,

like the pharaohs.

~  previously published in Praise the Undaunted

SEATTLE

photo: sharon auberle

SEATTLE

by Donna Hilbert

“ . . . but Wilson had no car.  He felt almost intolerably lonely.”

                                    Graham Greene, The Heart of the Matter

So homesick, I engaged wrong numbers

in conversation

for the sound of another

human voice

that year in Seattle when it rained three hundred days.

Not hard as it would at home

and then be done for months,

but just a light piss,

air always damp

like the baby’s diaper.

I watched pink fingers of mold

double every day

in the corner of the window

looking out on evergreens and endless grass.

I longed for LA--

palm trees and Hybrid Bermuda,

trees that let in light and grass with grace

enough to die back

yellow in the winter.

I hated the rain the natives praised

“rain makes everything green,” they’d say,

deranged as they were on chlorophyll and caffeine.

I was green too at nineteen,

with a shiny new husband, one baby,

belly ripening with the next.

My husband studied engineering at the U.

And I studied too--his books from World Lit—

Dostoevsky, Kafka, Camus.

My favorite was Graham Greene

The Power and the Glory, The Heart of the Matter—

burnt-out-cases

adrift in the existential sea.

And I thought then that I

was more displaced

than any whiskey priest or disaffected spy

which I declared to any wrong number

who would take the time

to listen.

~ first published in Fire

Blissing on the Season's First Snowfall

photo: sharon auberle

Blissing on the Season’s First Snowfall

by Charles Rossiter

I light a morning candle

and lift my cup of espresso

the hiss of the old radiator

purrs to me like a friendly cat

I lift my cup of espresso

and wish a silent wish

blissing on the season’s first snowfall

listening to the hiss of the old radiator

the kiss of morning espresso steam

rising to disappear in pearly air

outside, snow falls silent as a stalking cat

the candle flickers in columns of warm

air rising, I lift my cup of espresso

to the single silent wish, to always

and forever to this much love my life.

~ first published in the Paterson Literary Review