Category: Poetry

Redwood, horizontal

Tony Press

Where does the fallen tree go,
and why? Is it driven away,
branded like Hester?

Perhaps it takes 80 to Tahoe
then angles north
to reside
beside
its sister,
Fallen Leaf Lake.

And when the tree is fallin’, fallin’,
do we keep callin’, callin’ it back again,
or do the echoes of the Beatles
sadden us this time –
the jolting news
of John Lennon
shot and killed –
which I learned
as I sat alone
watching a dumb football game
my kids already asleep

Forty years ago.

Fallen trees.
Felled giants.
Faded love.
Where do they go?
Into our hearts.
If we let them.

Tony Press

Roots

Ellen Clayton

There’s an immovable tree inside me
carefully planted by my parents
Which they nurtured gently
each day and each year;
the roots growing in the same fertile soil as
An orchard of ancestors

My family keeps this
Fruitful, faithful tree flowering
So I am able to
thrive
I plant my feet firmly
Grow tall
above the cacophony
Of self-doubt and external judgement

And now, it’s my turn
Three tiny people relying on me and their
Father to tend the emerging shoots
of their identity,
Give them tools to flourish and bloom
We hope to cultivate confidence
To yield kindness, joy, strength, resilience

Our legacy:
An
unshakeable
sense of belonging grown from the
Roots
of our family tree

Ellen Clayton

Tropism

Gwyndolyn Hall

After a long winter
a small dragon palm left sitting
too far from a window,
her gentle neck bent at an unnatural angle,
her long green leaves lined in dark red truth,
whispered to me as I carried her to the sun porch:

Don’t feel bad, dear.
When faced with imperfect conditions,
we all twist ourselves towards the light.

Gwyndolyn Hall

The Particular Tilt of the Earth (at this time of year)

Margaret King

The particular tilt of the Earth right now
In the early fall
Allows the setting sun to piece light through the blazing maple trees
The ones we can see from our living room windows
So green in summer we don’t even think of them
Until now or until their leaves fall off
And we no longer have a natural screen between
Us and the rest of the world

If marriage is a perpetual dance
Of spinning toward each other and then apart again
Then we’re just orbiting ourselves
Rather
Please just let me find my way back to you
Over and over again

Through the deer path of your heart
That only I know
Thistles that grow thick to obscure and protect
The delicate rabbit with the quick-beating heart
Deep within and burst into wish fluff
At this time of year
So many wishes
To release on the wind

The Queen Anne’s Lace
That, tightly-bunched
Hides the sleeping caterpillar inside
These secrets only I know

Margaret King

Tending the Garden

Sonia Beauchamp

Dreams awaken
hidden hollows
of sanctuary.

A body made of ice
softens to powdered
snow.

Wanton
& wanting
& waiting

for the thaw
to reveal

lavender
lower lips.

An iris exhales.
A quiver of arrows
unfurls into the universe.

Ruffled petals ruminate
the approaching sun;

not all flowers
     bloom
     when you expect
nor bulbs
     take root.

I lose track
of years,

soften with age.

Sonia Beauchamp

to grow roots in coffee dirt

Madalena Daleziou

the sink is filled with coffee dirt
said my flatmate who never had a
sip, since the last school exam
so put two and two together
I run a sponge over stubborn
black specks the way I once ran it
on motherland dirt, wiping
my body clean—there’s none left
now, none of the dirt my people
impregnated with thyme, tomatoes,
and citrus trees—I touched my
cactus the day I moved in this
tenement and I should have seen
the aptness of the metaphor—
this is all I can grow; small and
thorny, few needs, no ties—
this is the only way I know to
grow roots: in coffee specks
unfiltered like mother dirt

the day I have strong black tea—
bag bathed 4 minutes—with milk
and a spoonful of sugar, I don’t
know if it’s an old home losing
ground or a new one gaining it
I crumble the paper-memory of the
balcony and the mosquito bites and
the tall glass of instant coffee-trash
with two sugar cubes and three ices
—telling myself tea is a spell my mother
would brew in our tealess country—
sugar tea feeds you after migraine
vomiting—telling myself my local
friends don’t have tea with any meal
so no need for me to see my
stretched pinkie finger as promise
and call it assimilation—telling
myself I grew in this land, not tall
but brave, not rootless but weaving
new roots planted in coffee dirt

Madalena Daleziou

Balloon Strings

Rebecca Harmon

The summer of 2014 I got paid to tie
balloon strings for three hours.
A lady came in demanding
aqua ribbon but we only had teal.
My fingers turned blue from too tight knots.
I liked it.

All my balloon strings tied to you.
Little bands of yellow, purple, and yes,
teal.
Strung together at the ears, wrists, and knees.
Let’s stay like this
you’d say.
Please
I’d reply.

You started undoing strings.
Just one little knot, gnawed
with your teeth.
I tied it to your shirt, belt loop, shoelace.
They all came undone.

Rebecca Harmon