Weaving is a woman’s craft, and I have pulled art
out of air, the shading subtle. I had strung the warp,
risked it, knowing some patterns fade
before they become weft, pulled apart
and combed smooth, rewoven beneath the shuttle.
Before you call me cold, unturnable
see what was spun for me and allotted.
I am making a live thing, and though the days are long
time is short, and I will not break beauty again
for the sake of passing promise, no matter
how fine the thread.
Shakespeare’s women were first
men in drag; a gaggle of girl-shaped wishes
sharpening to crone-bawdied wit. Some boys
make beautiful women. High tenors before breaking
are a beautiful thing, the art of the act
volleyed past dialog and into being.
Jules played Juliet, dull dagger
pressed between padded breasts
and we see the girl in the boy
dying for love, the gender mask
lifted again and again:
The Victor/Victoria dilemma
or the Tootsie trial; love peels lies
like layers of onion until nothing’s left
beyond the game, and the joy of it
is in the surface fake
that dazzles as it deludes those
who never look past a mask, or peek under a dress.
Well, the CSA did it again to me today, providing one of my favorite veggies. The rest of my family will not touch these, so the way I see it, more favas for me. Okay, so they are a pain in the butt to prepare but once you have done the prep work, you are in for a divinely nutty, spring flavor. I cooked mine this way, from localfoods.about. com.
I guess Hannibal Lecter and I have at least one thing in common (minus the eating of people).
LOVE this!
This is a response poem to Susan Daniels’ most excellent and funny poem, “No fairy tale”. Read it here first at:
https://susandanielspoetry.com/2013/07/08/no-fairy-tale/
* * *
Oops – sorry! I tried to pick a rose for you, but
have you ever tried doing that wearing gauntlets?
And once inside, my visor fell, I tripped, and
with all this damn armor, well, it weighs a bloody ton.
Sorry about your door.
I’ll go fell a tree in a stroke and
make you a new one.
I’m sure that ancient rowan by your window
must be blocking your view…
I am no princess waiting for rescue.
Any tower I am inside I own the keys to
and the dragon coiled at the base
is of my own making. You might bleed
the price the thorns I planted as seeds require,
surrounding stone walls and hope to find me
sleeping, waiting for a kiss to animate me,
and end up disappointed
when you break down the door
and find me awake and scowling,
flatfooted and ankle deep in weeding,
asking you why, knighthood aside
you lacked the grace to knock,
and what you have done to my roses.
I spent months on my lunch break in a bathroom using a breast pump when I worked in a hospital in order to keep breastfeeding my son after a return to work. Needless to say, this touched a HEAP of nerves. We need to support women who breastfeed.
I live in New York, and I see them everywhere – on subways, in coffee shops, on park benches, lying on their sides on picnic quilts, in restaurants while others are eating around them, in buses, in supermarkets, in department stores, on the streets. Women, pulling out their breasts from under their shirts, clipping open their bras, sometimes exposing a nipple, to feed a hungry child in the middle of a public place. I see them, and I think to myself:
I am a native of Finland, and I realize that our relationship with nudity in general is very different than in many other countries, largely due to our sauna culture which is as essential to being a Finn as 4th of July barbecues are for Americans. We grow up understanding that a naked body, or bare breasts…
View original post 593 more words
It’s not so much the cross words
any will work in laddered spontaneity
we call a game. Language
is promiscuous, links to fill
missing letters, words twisted to fit
any story. Avoid bozo or orgasmic
if you can, but in the end it’s not the names we call
or what is promised
but the number of points each letter gives:
Fucking is a great triple-word score;
so good even nuns will use it.
***all about puzzles at Dverse today.
Susan Daniels Poetry 