The Morn's Night

An hour ago,

I was a child of fables,

pokeweed.

A tongue roller,

chewer of grass―

I could graft an oak from a twig.

Meanwhile, it's another o'clock;

acorns drop from grown trees.

The moon bellows baritone;

omits the chorus,

replaces it with zees.

Vitruvian sweetness finds me,

springing spreadeagle―

wheel of honeysuckle.

I forget sleep;

shake out the pillowcase,

wrap it around my head

for a babushka―

sound a klaxon,

hail a hackney carriage.

Get to Falkirk.

tk/June 2014


R.A.D. Stainforth adds a bit of magic... 

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*A Game of Patience, 1937 by Meredith Frampton 

Chrysalis

Shadows settle brown-eyed,

The Moth and the Lamp, Cesar Santos 

warm-palmed;

cocoon discarded

in yesterday's cobweb.

Remove the horn-rims,

inherit the bookish gaze,

the soft porch bulb

of a summer night.

Watch the onslaught

of the pink moon,

breathe star-scattered

through the silent spots.

The mottled skirt

holds brunette blood;

unlike the skittish sister,

who butterflies sunshine like toast.

tk/September 2013 

Many thanks to the talented  R.A.D. Stainforth, for reading this poem.  

Moonstruck

The moon opens

his laughing Buddha mouth,

pumps me full

of tides and sky.

Dreams from a cratered bowl,

gold and overgrown,

swim circles

of unrequited sleep.

I paddle tree-lined,

camera-shy ―

desirous of secret rivers,

ungrounded culverts.

At dawn, he holds a up a mirror.

I look just like him ―

round-faced,

crescent-eyed.

tk/July 2013

This poem was expertly read by R.A.D. Stainforth. 

Supermoon 2013, Julio Cortez, AP 

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Waiting

I sit on the end of the bed;
I touch my head for hairpins.

The moon reaches wide
through the venetian blind,

pans-and-scans nipples and fingers,
pins held in my teeth.

Pennine shadows graffiti your face,
placing secret acronyms.

I hum after the same rainbow's end ―
I know you pretend not to watch,

not to notice the approaching storm,
nothing but the single pair of socks.

tk/April 2013 

Thank you R.A.D. Stainforth for this beautiful read. 

Monhegan's Schoolteacher, 2004, by Jamie Wyeth 

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The moon made me do it...

Every month around the new moon ... usually a day or two before ... or on the day of ... I find myself in a whirl of cleaning and organizing.  I know, a rare thing for this lazy Libra. This time it was weeding through a stack of 150 magazines, tearing out the stuff I wanted to save, and recycling the rest.  And for dessert, I sorted through my sewing kit ... got rid of that old green bias tape ... and put it in one of my vintage tackle boxes. I couldn't bear to take out the Cash's woven name labels I used to sew inside the children's clothes, so I kept them, just because.  They make me happy.

We are not afraid to look under the bed,

or to wash the sheets:

we know that life is messy.

We know that somebody has to clean it up,

and that only if it is cleaned up 

can we hope to start over, and get better.

Marsha Norman
as quoted in Interviews With Contemporary Women Playwrights