Sublime=Donald, Lowenberg, Mendes, Lee - Day 17 aaduna NPM

Ruin

All the dusty caves of

Sundays

           connecting like Westerns

      on stormy afternoons

of television macaroni

and cheese

       to keep me company

while your will in the other room

      ironing your dress

flat, your back

     poured into it

like a jack hammer

vacuuming

siphoning all your

yesterdays

         I cracked the icy steps

no one else could

discovering

   beneath the foot worn stones

my will

eyeing it cautiously

for signs

       of fakery.

We ate cakes on Monday

marzipan and jam

soft and pliable as joy.

            I got through all those Tuesdays

with the trains trampling the night

like lost

dogs down the wynd.

         

© 2014 Erika Donald                         

Berkeley, California               

Erika Donald (photo provided)

* * *

Coming Ashore

Popeye’s I yam what I yam, and

that’s all that I yam looped through

every swimming stroke,

            crawling toward the shore of my sovereign heart

Beach my belly on drying

sand, I lay upon these hard-earned granules,

this sifted mound

sprawled ribbon kelp of braided hair

            flung across cheek pressed imprint, gulping air

Below,

a clam’s bubble bursts

and Ladyslipper shells tumble head over foot

            along hem of foam, exposing their marsupial pockets

Empty now

            yet sober, as the scalloped tide recedes

Breathing, yet still

            I lay upon this remembered island      (ahhhhh….)

renewing something

of my truest self.

© 2017 Zigi Lowenberg                    

Harlem, New York                

Zigi Lowenberg (photo provided)

* * *

XXV

For face after face of grudging time. Of growling misery. Of grumpy dismissal.

Finding time to care. Finding space for hurting lives.

The wounded animal finishing its’ breath. The emotional scars of life. The ‘be strong’. The ‘make it on your own’. ‘Don’t cry’. Self-reliant spirit stumbling too often. Falling to hunger and pain. To failure.

Who lifts them? Who finds joy again? Our children remember the helping. The helper. Remember hardening for safety.

Lessons of cruelty and hatred. Of meanness. Our bullies stand the yard as gladiators. Fall under the downturned thumbs of the crowd.

Do we keep them from the sword?

© 2014 Edward Mendes                   

Varysburg, New York                       

 

Edward Mendes (photo provided)

* * *

A quarter of it

The noise retrieved as the silver orb

dissolved into her comfort shape.

There was still the box you handed me

the other hurried afternoon with

your sweat and ignorance and all:

The childhood,   your face,     a flashback.

It’s odd. We’ve never shared the sweetness

in it. Not on a hill, not in the stars.

The feast is always for innate families

we once were: the time your smile reflected

my devotion and warmth to a momentary

figure. Your eyes shimmered against my voice.

It was as if we have hardly been more than

photos. The box sits still by

the desk. Not to waste what it meant to

house, I had to take out a moon from the

four. And managed to swallow a cutout of

our remaining past.

© 2014 Ho Cheung Lee (Peter)         

Hong Kong    

Ho Cheung Lee (Peter)  photo provided

 *   *   *

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