Tag Archives: National Poetry Month

Abacus (pantoum)

 

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Quietly apparent all that arises naturally as life

Synchronous arising no before or after only simultaneous

Yet counting on something passing clicking as if on an abacus

I draw out in the sand the footprints I leave behind as I go

 

Synchronous arising no before or after only simultaneous

Each day a counting from birdsong to bloom tender traces each

I draw out in the sand the footprints I leave behind as I go

To be washed clear, here the winds doing this work, a purification

 

Each day a counting from birdsong to bloom tender traces each

Drawing out that which has been dormant in other seasons

To be washed clear, here the winds doing this work, a purification

The counting as a momentary way of relating to the vast timeless

 

Drawing out that which has been dormant in other seasons

Gathering the sum of all the parts of what is a living precipice

The counting as a momentary way of relating to the vast timeless

This precipice, a burgeoning so fierce that it claims within it the calm

 

prompt: pantoum

27-30 April 2018

cc Janice Sandeen

Being Held Under: the dream (pantoum)

Sleep and the torment of undifferentiated events occurring and reoccurring

Crying out to the nursemaid that appears, an invented character –not an ally

Furiously I dig into depths of sediment made (up) of eons before and still to come

Anonymous things cascade as their very formation, epic some, insidious others

Crying out to the nursemaid that appears an invented character, not –an ally

Sure that help must come, as sure as previous layers settled Once Upon a Time

Anonymous, things cascade as their very formation –epic, some insidious, others

Remaining unresolved, thus acting as antigen, both antagonist and protagonist

Sure that help must come, as sure as previous layers once settled upon, a time

Repeating itself once again, yet the faces and objects take on different colors, shapes

Remaining unresolved thus acting as, antigen both antagonist/protagonist

Clambering to the ungraspable source, the surface –life support, of which there is none

Repeating itself once again yet the faces… and objects take on different colors, shapes

What mystery this puzzle that takes itself so resolutely magnificent in its diffuse distillations

Clambering to the ungraspable, source the surface, life support of which there is –none

Better than waking (up) dreaming –only to recognize the once hidden throngs effervesced

 

Thank you to the Richmond (CA) Poet Laureates Daniel Ari, Rob Lipton, and Ciera Jevae-Gordon for the writing prompts this past month during National Poetry Month. 🙂

[This poem is a pantoum, “a Malay repeating form, written in quatrains, in which the second and fourth lines of each stanza become the first and third lines of the next one.” –from p. 195, The Poetry Dictionary by John Drury, ©1995 Story Press; Cincinnati, OH.]

Dry Winter Spring

dry skin dry winter

it’s been a dry season

coming to the surface now

 

hot air balloons rise in the distance

spring is here and

no mud in sight, clean shoesdry winter spring

 

cracked lip cracked skin

all those years, parched

and homeostasis still

 

this season is this one, now

part of the whole, of the All

perhaps a bouquet of choices

 

among what is choice-less

looking below the surface

and beyond the markers of time

 

and where I stand, sitting

still or actively creating

amidst it all, amidst all

 

As the All, the all that I am

cannot help but be that

dry skin, cracked lip

 

paired dance, two step three

forward back, circling

hot air rises, takes up wing

 

single piano melody and cadence

joined by a symphonic chorus

that I see all around me

 

Another season will be

will be what it is then

even now that season emerges

 

Apparent in ways not yet visible

the tear running down the face

surfaces after long held heart

 

Cracking a smile has other allies

even if only there under the skin

opens out and then returns quietly

 

like a breeze scattering seeds

that would otherwise reside

close in, close by where they fall

 

singing of loss beneath the breath

keeps the flowers ready to blossom

their scent barely contained and rising

 

crispness of air, spirit, sight, and earth (heart)

such ways sing brightness of their own

elegy only for nostalgia alone

cc Janice Sandeen ~ Arroyo Seco, NM

 

National Poetry Month ~ An evening of “Poetry in Translation” @ SOMOS in Taos, NM

As part of April as National Poetry Month, here in Taos there have already been many wonderful gatherings, readings, and performances devoted to our love of poetry and local poets here in Taos. There are three more events this week, one workshop and two evenings of poetry readings. I will be presenting something different than I have ever before ~ a cross-pollination between my poetry and my photography, as well as a chance to share a number of my visual poems.

On Saturday evening at 5:30pm at SOMOS (Society of the Muse of the Southwest), I will be joining curator Ariana Kramer and two other poets, Sonja Kravanja and Fiona Sze-Lorrain, to share on a theme of Poetry in Translation. If you are any where in the local area of Taos, New Mexico, please consider joining us! These events are free (a few specific ones are not) and are presented by SOMOS and the Taos Arts Council, along with our amazingly creative curator (and also poet), Ariana Kramer. The latter of the month has another 4 events. See the flyer below for more details.

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Concurrent with these events, I am also participating in “Poetry in Public Places”, where local poets have printed a poem of theirs, which was then placed in a frame and now dons the walls of one of numerous local establishments. My poem, “Brightness Spectrum“, is at Coffee Cats in the John Dunn Shops arcade right near the Taos Plaza. If you go for a visit to read the poems, please thank our hosts, Coffee Cats, for participating in this cultural celebration of poetry and local poets. 🙂

And a final note of mention, since my presentation is in the form of a PowerPoint presentation, I will have it documented and hope to share it here on my blog, in future!