three works (they say/about the spheres/interpretentions)
1.
they say
mountain clouds
implode in a colic
a stare brings on
revolts
snow buntings invite
green eyes
fibrous bones
roll down a mulch hill
a rasp in his caws
one catches
wild weeds
pierce fresh wombs
in a clam shell
of not-thereness
2.
about the spheres
a wink enough to lift the moon’s hem
a slivered blue licks paradise
part grit part fluff the foaming universe
constellations stringing rocks into falsies
concoctions a boom of moon craters
3.
interpretentions
with my lips, I accept the many ways grass wears dew that Van Gogh kept secret
I agonize so much so that my stomach contracts regurgitating Dali’s white lies
a valley of lilies I hurtle into with eyes closed on Monet skinny dipping
the spastic leg throws of marionettes as Picasso dreamt I can
together shedding barnacles from cliffs chipped clean in cubes Mondrian says his own
thieves inhabit the hippocampus of dawn beetles scaling the spirals of Gaudi’s nights
my singed heart hurts so the onyx solitaire Klee entraps with dancing threads
otata April 2017
meanings on walls (for One Shoot Sunday)
graffiti in the Lansing area, Michigan, photo by Chris Galford
1. squiggles
your words mere
squiggles on walls
if but smiles
on dry leaves–
when clouds take over the sun
the butterfly dies
2. waves
on the wall
waves splatter a froth
the sky sheds–
is it rain?
our hand carvings on sea air
but the mindless moon
3. sky
we sip dreams
no one knows of what–
were it earth
it would roll
drums beating down on our sky
to give up the stars
4. ripple
heat seeps off
tips of lanceolate
promises
disguised flames–
in the waters a ripple
once a breath twice life
5. blue fish
ocean lure–
we dig for stone fists
to ripple
the silence
a blue fish whispers to me
a broken flower
Copyright © by Alegria Imperial 2011
Five ‘haiku-induced’ shadorma, a Spanish sestet or 6-line poetic form in 3/5/3/3/7/5 syllables per line–my first attempt at it–in response to the Picture Photo Prompt Sunday (One Shoot Sunday) from photos of Chris Galford of graffit’d walls around the Lansing area in Michigan and posted at One Stop Poetry, the inimitable gathering place for poets and artists. Check us out!
the calm/rereading cards/round and round (3 tanka on the calm from the earthquake elsewhere)
Mie and me on her last visit to Vancouver
1.
the calm–
from Kyoto Mie writes
far from earthquake
the wedding garden today
light snow on cherry buds
2.
rereading cards–
from Michio in Saitama
her New year’s wishes
of Rabbit hopes and dreams
today mine for her in pray’r
3.
round and round
moon and earth mirror each other
chaos of winds
ruined faces blemished cheeks
to be cleansed over and over
The Birthing (one shot Wednesday)
I was told an island
rises to its toes when love is
spoken:
waves mount clouds
birds turn dolphins singing.
Flowers bedded on
corals spew beads at
sunrise, winging up as
galaxies mutely
winking at words.
When love is
spoken, Earth shifts axis, faces
eyes limpidness had irked,
takes flings nudged out of
madness—shards shooting as if
aimed though swirling–
and breathes:
first, a shroud shields the pain, next,
a rainbow clears those eyes
for birthing.
Posted for One Shot Wednesday at One Stop Poetry blog. Join other poets who write verses for love, read those of others, leave a word of encouragement and/or insight with the same love and respect. Post your piece on your blog and sign up in the Mr. Linky list.
First snow (one shot Wednesday)
Hush,
heaven stealthily drops to earth in clouds that cease
breathing, wings folded on trees, prayers
poised for flight.
We walk tipped on toe-points
to taste to feel this heaven dropping,
melting, sizzling, burning through black grounds—
our iced-beings.
Hush,
heaven drops from ir-recognizable skies
on whorled grounds our rages disowned
muting prayers of those who sigh.
Hush,
though the heart has no ears.
I am posting this poem for One Shot Wednesday at the One Stop Poetry blog.
Join us – throw in your verses. Here are the rules (taken directly off their blog):
1. Write a poetic piece & post it on your blog
2. Then let us know about your post. Link back to One Shot
3. Sign up in the Mr Linky list, linking directly to your post, AFTER you’ve posted it.
4. Go visit others who have signed up! Offer support & encouragement. Share your love of words and insight respectfully. Please try to visit as many participating poets as you can. We all could use and appreciate kind feedback.
About
autumn wind
wondering about lilies
in a mountain pond
Tell me a writer who really gets a satisfying jornal, in Spanish a daily wage or its equivalent, and I’ll bare a spirit in constant bouts of doubtfulness. Does a writer earn more because of what he writes and how he does it? Or is a writer paid more or less because of who he is? Is it money or honor he expects to receive?
Ahhh … but money as wage, and praise or honor as reward would be too predictable, too common as Job lamented in the Book of Job. It is in these lines that read: “Is not man’s life on earth nothing more than pressed service, his times no better than hired drudgery? Like the slave, sighing for the shade, or the workman with no thought but his wages, months of delusion I have assigned to me, nothing for my own but nights of grief. Lying in bed I wonder, ‘When will it be day?’ Risen I think, ‘How slowly evening comes!’
Restlessly I fret till twilight falls. Swifter than a weaver’s shuttle my days have passed, and vanished, leaving no hope behind. Remember that my life is but a breath, and that my eyes will never again see joy.”
Not money but joy is the ultimate wage as the passage implies. And joy is not hard to earn for it is in everyday life if we have eyes to see, a nose to smell, fingers to touch, ears to hear–a heart beating. This to me, is how a writer earns a daily wage. His wages then take the guise of treasures his heart can transfigure into a universe of thought that taps into other hearts, that causes a swirl in the depth of other souls, or that makes wings to sprout on leaden heels.
Sometimes not joy but rueful, poignant moments are my pick. Take what I earned once: On my walk home in my neighborhood, I caught two clumps of snowdrops–such tiny blossoms smaller than fingertips that do not look up but shyly droop close to black patches on the ground winter has frozen. That afternoon in the frosty wind, they trembled as if ready to turn away and run but how could they? For that poignant moment on seeing the wintry rain beat on the fragile snowdrop–as if pushing it to go home now, go to sleep–I earned my jornal, my daily wage.
Once on summer walk, the crackle of dried leaves just hit me both like the laughter of children and sobs long suppressed. Neither one of them would resolve the dryness, but I recalled how each does bring tears: laughter for joy, sobs for healing that comes with the release of a dammed-up pain. My jornal that day came as two haiku.
Fall has since shortened the day and the heart begins to crave for lost space that it doesn’t even recall which or where. I feel that most treasures have turned into mush so much so I wouldn’t be able to sift them off the ground. Yet I caught the dying day yesterday–so glorious in the gold of autumn it opened a flip side of serene heaven. Blades of grass coated in diadems of rain that carpet the lawns render royal walks poor by imitation. A burst of red maple against an inky blue sky humbled me, a soul bragging about her skill to recreate beauty in words.
I suppose I’m taking Job’s reflections to heart. I’d rather not gloss over each day and look beyond what’s there, right before me, or else fragile as is my breath one day “my eyes may never again see joy” to write. With what then will I compare the eternal joy, the ultimate wage I await?
Yet for now, as other eyes hanker to make the invisible visible, I put a tag on some moments of joy. Like on seeing the snowdrops, I paid myself $200 as my jornal.
What could have been yours?
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