September

September

 

I remember September, and those heady days of 1971 –

ok, vaguely –

before my sister was born and the world was mine alone.

 

Earth, Wind, and Fire –

those horns

always those horns

brought the sun on my skin,

my braids,

my face.

 

Those harmonies –

take me to those early adolescent days –

tape recorder recorded versions

dancin’ in September

recorded from tinny AM stations,

static

YEOW!

to play back –

dancing in closed-door bedrooms in sock feet

to slide and try the disco moves I saw on Soul Train.

 

Even then I wanted to dance like that –

maybe not disco but with some kind of rhythm beyond the Cree drum beating in my heart.

 

The bass,

funky and deep in my hips,

waking something in me I had seen hints of in my speeding heart beat

when cute boys

and some disco girls

were passing by in clouds of Herbal Essence

and Gee, Your Hair Smells Terrific –

washed into feathered hair with gem-studded fingers

and gold-flecked water.

 

But those horns!

Those horns –

that YEOW!

are/were Everything!

Sunshine in my soul.

Sunshine in my soul in spite of any other dark, oily creatures vying for my heart.

 

Do you remember…?

those horns –

that base line –

makes me smile for those late days of the disco decade

when all I wanted to do was

dance in September

            when there was never a cloudy day…YEOW!

            when love was here to stay.

 

© R. L. Elke

Aug 5/17

 

 

 

Hour 1 : Life to Death

On the parched face of earth

Where died, my joy and mirth

I recollect the residues of love

For existing beneath and above

The seeding of our joy

Starving for water with continuous cry

My tears are enough to water

The dead plant, to alter

It’s doomed! O’ my fire maid

Give me power to fade

The presence of mixed wind

Like two hearts under a skinned

Body of a beauteous flower

Before the approaching of death hour

Goddess of the Seas (first hour)

Her senses are tied to the roots of the trees

She sways her hips like that of the rolling waters

Her body illuminates the darkness that envelopes me

As I float there in the frozen waters, I watch as she pulls the moon closer to the terra and listen to her stormy songs of the night sea

Every creature of flight, every cricket, every grasshopper and frog adhere to her serenade and sing along in glorious harmony

I fall low into the depths of their song, my body lets go as I sink deeper into the dark blue sea

This mother of Earth, this Goddess of the lake with her golden robes and indigo feathers reaches out to me

Her arms reaches for mine, as we touch I am struck with the strength of my sisters, thousands, pulling me up and out from my briny deep

I was submerged with all of mine and the world’s icy cold tears

Drowning within all of the lands’ murky fears

But this Goddess of the Sea, my sister in arms, with all of her Earthly possessions saved me from inner harm

She gifted me her force

She gifted me her songs

She gifted me her beauty

…her form…her intense silence of the night

Her cries became my cries

Her tears are my sacred waters

Inherently, I am she

the Goddess of the Earthly Seas

 

 

Poem #1

Tough getting started

now I’m on the clock

eighteen minutes more

to post my first on twenty four

 

It will get better

#1 Secret

I kept this a secret

Being here, in my house, by myself

In my head, where I already spend so much time

Living a life internal

Because no one needed to know

Of the years I have waited

Of the years I have wasted

Until I could finally feed the words.

 

What I Didn’t Do During My First Year of Retirement

Grow our my hair and beard
and parade up and down Holly St weekly
in neon colored tunics
carrying a sign warning about the coming apocalypse

Memorize Robert Pinsky’s volume of poems to read aloud
and go to the torn down mills site
reciting them weekly in a voice that vibrates with
the gulls and rusting rocket-like silos

Go to every major league ballpark
and stay long enough to sit through the national anthem
while carrying a sign with a quote by Borges
“poets, like the blind, can see in the dark”

Open up a small bookstore in an out-of-the-way basement office space
and change weekly the order of
how the publications merge in various piles
of animal sculptures

Reduce my what will I do list
and cross off the penultimate possibility
leaving a final and ultimate descriptor
of how I will spend my time until the last line is erased

Astraphobia

Rico is screaming

Point of no return, walking

Into silent thunder and

Overhead zigzags

Blinding

Inhale a deep breath

Before a summer rainstorm-

Amazing ozone

Too bad pittie has

Astraphobia

 

Diane Morinich, 2017

In My Element – Pain – Hour One

Not my idea of fun

To light a fuse and run

From the flame

Playing catch with blame –

Tossing it between us like a hot potato

Ripped from the Earth

Where I left hasty skidded footprints

As I chased sorrow

Ending the trail where I squatted to give birth

To a lonely tomorrow

Grown since I met you from a blind embryo

Bloodying the earth and dirt

With the afterbirth of hurt.

 

When my waters broke

And poured from my eyes.

They somehow spoke

And ruined my disguise

And the winds of change performed a dance macabre

Through holes bored by lies

Deep in my heart.

1~17

Wet from birth~

I gave you breath.

Your spirit burns so bright!

How can I ever bury you?