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Featured Reader & Member Poems
Daedalus' Daughter
My father and I both fly at night.
He takes off from a waterbed
moored at the edge of the lake,
while I, a land-locked second-story sleeper,
rise and skim the night air
thirty miles away.
He soars high, agile and air-borne,
– bursting out
of formation –
while I hover below ceilings
rise through doorways
swim just above the details of the day.
And tho' we've never met
on these nocturnal trips
we each recognized at once
the joy the other recalled:
the muscles in the arms drawing down
as the torso rises aloft, pulling away, coasting,
veering with the will of the body.
In these solitary flights, not buoyed
by mite-bitten feathers,
castoffs of a better bird,
but borne up entirely –
and only –
by the arched frame of imagination
we leave behind the ideograms of our lives
the sculpted rooms, gardens, and roads:
seen from above,
a labyrinth.
— Anne Coon
February 2005 from Daedalus’ Daughter (FootHills
Press, 2004)
saddened
that my summer need for you
has
vanished…
wood smoke up a winter chimney
— Ruth Kennedy
December, 2004
Ivy
Cardinals and classical
Unwrite the rhetoric
Remind me of missions
And methods.
A gardener, I nourish
Soils and seeds
Throw up the sun
Past the saints
Watch the ivy creep
Through classrooms
Crumble the brick
Of before.
— Jennifer Kehoe
November, 2004
A Fan
Observes
A Jump
Shot
Ball spins toward
The shooter
even as it glides
away from her
to slip -- a perfect
Cinderella foot –
into the net
to be caressed
by the soft twine
for a moment
and released.
Shadowed
Light
Golden-light-turned-pink
by the stained glass
bathes his sweaty
hairy chest
He guides
the boy's hand
to different hair
below...
— Ed Scutt
October, 2004
At the Intersection of
Clinton and Broad
Then I was out in it:
milked up evening, sudden
glistenings of sun on
sodden pavement
sudden
gustings through of
half-yolk winds that kissed
my clothes my skin my hourly
wage-earning hands.
Then I was into it:
clear sunlit streaks of ink
on inked up air the street
was buzzing sharp
my feet high heals
like hardened light hit one-two
one down into darkling bright.
—
Harmony Button
September, 2004
Coalition of the Willing
I’m gonna start a Coalition of the Willing –
Nate, Zeke, me, and Nate’s kid sister Lorna
We’re gonna go down to the gun show at the drive-in parking lot
And pick up a couple semi-automatics, a shotgun, and some pistols
We’re gonna go down to the First USA Bank
and give that teller an ultimatum
Yes, the Coalition of the Willing’s going to show the flag and be a pretty
sight, I’ll tell
you, with all that hardware agleamin’
We’re gonna make a friendly withdrawal, and no one better get in our way, or
there’ll be
a few collateral damages
The way we see it, what’s good enough for the President is good enough for
us
We’re gonna conduct a pre-emptive strike against the possibility of empty
pockets
And we don’t need no UN authorization to do it.
— John Roche
August, 2004
Politics
If I want you
to open this jar
I'll ask
It angers me when
you take it
to show me how
Don't wave flags
over my head
My own soil
is not to belittle
I'm heady-strong
arsenal at ready
and before you open
anything I want to know
what's in this jar
— Wynne McClure
from Torn for Peace (FootHills
Press, 2004)
Black Is Now White
We're coming to bless you with bombs.
We rape your women and
shoot your children because
we love you
and want you to
prosper and be happy.
We only lie about you so
truth can triumph.
You are evil, but we love you
and pour our love upon you with
devotedly guided missiles
don't you understand?
We are enslaving you
to make you free.
— Paul Bither
from Torn for Peace (FootHills
Press, 2004)
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