April 2011 | back-issues, poetry
Standing Upon The Sands
I cast my sinker
Deep into depths
Fishing for instructive humanity,
Fishing in a sea
Of sweat and abuse,
I spend my leisure hours,
Suffering,
As we all suffer together.
Never Reached
1
Seems in moments clearly sighted,
Far from damnable pride,
Seems I wished away my life
Wistful wishes without
a) result
b) because
I seem,
Now beneath the lens of sixty,
Less lent to fancies guide
Who fleetingly flew me
Where ill won’t usher,
Less today than yesterday,
Yesterday less than before.
Like the stunted tree,
The bonsai,
I reached out roots
To blind clay walls,
Aged and misty,
Aged beyond my wise,
Coarse beyond my hopes,
Steeps stretching past centuries
Aged and ochre
Too tall to see over or beyond.
Oh wonder killing wish of thunder
Rolling off a sleeve
While a lightning pen writes
In nights dumb darkness
Wonder,
Will inky storms
Soar me away
To future world’s gray praise?
2
Man I know can
c) become.
I know it happened before.
History need not lie!
Great men show their force of “will”
Then die (most)
Saturated with self satisfaction
Or least,
Feeling the wealth of their accomplishment
Some few, few believers
Offering wreaths at their altars.
So why not wish myself away
Into efforts beyond my reach?
Mighty efforts
Like the late great did seek.
Why not seek,
Each effort always more
Than that which came before
Seeking further reaches of the mind
Hoping walls enclosure not so coarse
It stifles my amour?
3
Oh but why,
I want to know,
Do efforts tumble down,
Back down to days before reach
Beneath me at a lesser steep
Leaving me wishing a way up
Or worse,
Wondering why,
Why reach,
Why climb at all
When faced with oh,
So steep a wall.
Richard Jay Shelton was born in 1946 on a navy base in Coronado, California, but has lived most of his life in Los Angeles. The six poems selected are part of three larger works titled “Carefully Chosen Words,” “Pathetic Poetics,” and “Apathetic Poetics.” His poetry has appeared in The Chaffin Journal, The Poet’s Haven, The Eclectic Muse, Pulse Literary Journal, and is forthcoming in Down in the Dirt, The Homestead Review, and Willard & Maple.
April 2011 | back-issues, poetry
Staking Claim
She brims with enamor over the notion
Of the rolling curves; the fat
Of the land.
She forages through the land’s lovely crevices,
Prospecting for the offering of its fallen fruits.
The pristine, primeval soil lays dormant.
Like her, its surface is only stirred by
Sporadic storms.
Unlike the beasts that ruled the land
Before the cruelty of humanity devoured it,
She scorns the challenge of brutish pursuit.
The land is her darling.
It never challenges her place to tramp on it.
It cannot threaten her with infidelity.
The supple, comfortable nature of
The fat of humanity repels her.
Its complexity, uncertainty,
And the manner in which it moves, thinks,
And refuses to regard her.
She reserves the right to sink her stake
Into the gritty soil, the unresponsive regions,
Of others.
And only into the parts that allow themselves
To safely be walked on.
But the soil shelters something,
Rooted far beneath the fathoming of man.
Beneath its layers that are marked by
Innumerable manufactured years,
Hidden within its body of powdery rock,
And profoundly inexplicable parts,
Which were fiercely forced asunder by the
Fervor of floods,
The icy blanket of inclement winters,
Slashed and scorched, but never consumed,
By ancient flame:
A secret.
She, a mere sliver
Of rapidly disintegrating sinew,
Will never know
That the dirt of the earth
Won’t be owned.
The Cards Are Stacked Against Me
In a drab den
that clings to a buzzing Brooklyn block,
a woman performs
experiments of the spirit
with her mind.
Though, perhaps,
not of the supernatural kind.
The pallid paper of her hand
is a map of ink blue veins,
like worn river beds
alongside well trodden tracks
of rickety gypsy caravans.
Or maybe just a printed map
of New York subway trains.
The withered tips of her fingers
rasp dryly over the faces
of battered cornered cards.
These relics of Celtic eccentrics,
whose minds danced with runes and romance;
The Hierophant,
The Hanged Man;
Dealt into a hasty mound with barely a glance.
You will find love…
You will find happiness…
You will find luck…
I recall a film that I once saw
A star of Scandinavian cinema
adorned in a costume cloak
(hoop earrings, and the like),
The cliché, not yet tired or trite.
The mid century model of modern novelty
in flickering black and white.
The hard young hearts of New York
won’t open for her lore.
Her lair, unchanged through the ages,
beside a vintage clothing store.
She sags in her worn costume cloak,
and cloaks her Brooklyn accent.
You will find love…
The Lovers.
You will find happiness…
The Magician.
For a twenty dollar fine…
The Fool.
Foolishly lured by neon words.
A Psychic Readings sign.
The cards should be aligned;
And their meanings: cryptic, wise.
Instead, they pile and pile.
And I smile and smile
at this aimless act.
My charity is hers,
And hers is mine.
Do you have a boyfriend?
No.
You will! You will!
Do you have a job?
No.
Oh, but you will!
Do you have friends?
Not really.
Oh. But you will.
She has cast her wicked spell:
The old fashioned feeling of good will.
I step outside to sidelong glances;
The cheeky faces of two hip girls.
They scan me with pious surprise.
You have been scammed,
Cool eyes imply.
He likes you, I can tell,
one girl remarks to her forlorn friend.
Her words are free and flippant
as she flips her cool hair cut,
but mine cost twenty bucks:
I will find love,
I will find luck.
Celeste Walke is a writer, visual artist, designer, and musician. She is currently looking for agent representation for her first novel, “The Roar of the Dandelion”. Her passion for writing is equaled by her passion for the visual arts. After living in New York for six years, she now resides in Los Angeles. She has displayed her art in galleries in New York and Los Angeles. She loves to use rich metaphor to explore the internal dynamics of relationships and the human condition.
January 2011 | back-issues, poetry
The Last Remaining Ghost
The last remaining ghost
In a world bald and gone wrong,
For no one wants to stay,
And no one wants to play
With all the children snug in the night,
While their parents cap the evening
And peacefully drift toward the dark.
No one is judging them,
Everyone is judging them,
They can’t be themselves with the ghost in the room.
“Stop staring,”
“I heard a sound,”
Litter lines the cracks in the floors,
The wood creaks and squeals.
Snug in their beds they look to the north,
The winter breeze shreds their fleece.
But children, don’t be scared;
There is no monster in your closet,
There is only the chill of the night,
But it cannot be seen,
Not by them or by him.
Nevermore
Drop the anchor on the shore,
For we shall leave here nevermore;
It’s paradise that’s in store.
The trees bloom fruit tender and sweet,
As all the life we generally meet;
To awaken the seed that’s what’s in store,
For we shall leave here nevermore.
Obscenity
Obscenity twists the knife in the heart of the town,
Day by day they go around falsely amused.
Dubbing the houses and roadways to the stillness of sound,
Living a life of stone.
The day Nick Adams fell into the lake,
Fundamentality went with him.
The day Nick Adams was burned at the stake,
Obscenity lifted the veil.
Thunder struck the tip of the church’s cross,
Through mud and dirt and spirit.
Burning a piece of nothing-a-loss,
A crack in the stone was found.
Foaming crowds in the night lit scene,
Their spirits lifted and smiles cracked.
The harmony changed from silence to obscene,
The falsely amused no longer false.
The Eye is a’ Coming to Seize You Again
He crept the morning stairs,
Each creak weeps frightful sighs.
Afraid of gathering glairs,
With engraved hatred in both eyes.
A shiver crept down his spine,
To awake and douse in history.
The cries of innocents unknown,
A bleak truth pawn to misery.
His conscience sighs for a goal,
He sees the withering of the mass.
Another mode of stiff control,
No spirits grave for none shall pass.
A city of wine and gold now bust,
A land now barren, lost, and slain.
One man, one power, now who to trust,
As the eye is a’ coming to seize you again.
All trampled and torn his body molds,
Contorted as each of the worlds go.
Fewer are left the further it unfolds,
What shall be done my companion, my bro?
On this day he sees this worldly truth,
But hides the real from the guilt and the shame,
The dead in the world corrupting the youth,
With powerful hands our masters to blame.
January 2011 | back-issues, poetry
Owl Dad Tells a Dragon
no you may not come in
there is still one left
king, he bars the doors
against the night
guards still on either side
keep watch and look
if a moon too appears
see their spears in its light
but shields to cover heart
this you need always
he says in closing
the book, turns lights
out overhead
and down the dark night
dreaming she lay safe
outside pining in the wind
a claw and cold breath
in the branches caught
and choking at what throat
the night has yelling
do not let it in, do not let it in
Alfred Stieglitz Shoots the Clouds
I struck at it for years. Hands raised,
I hollowed out the form,
the photograph, took all
reference away: no tree branch,
no birds frozen
in the scraping stroke of a wing,
nothing to say here or when.
But the tools weren’t right. The empty blue,
emulsified, was too pale, too light
to hold this weight. Clouds
I set into it burst and sank.
Until I felled it, found
the solution that turned the bright day dark.
Emotion without scale or form,
an absence trapped
between paper and glass,
they hang on walls as testament:
I stood alone and looking up
put words into the mouth
of the terrible, of the speechless sky.
When I Say Romance
When I say romance, I do not mean romance, not
at least, as you intend, do not mean
the quilled yellow throats of songbirds,
their fat, banded wings and black eyes, the notes
of their song. When I say love, understand
I mean the word far or along, see
the streets of Venice, its lagoon, the flat stones
over the water making a way.
So we strike and miss: shoot darts whose steel tips
kiss at their soft target. Words
that would promise or presage but cannot hit
their mark, our wit. I listen for you but it is an arrow
dropping to earth, a pipe of bone, the crow’s voice
clicking like cold stones, that I hear.
Terremoto de Valdivia, 1960
I held my mother’s hand as we walked towards the bright
display case, stacked with croissants, tiny cookies,
its tall cakes frilled like Easter dresses, tarts tucked
with dark berries, each facet of the raspberry gleaming.
Cautioned not to touch, I waited. She went to the counter
for my father’s cake, laughed with the shop girl
who folded its cardboard carry-out box.
Red body of it startling under pale frosting, his favorite.
Mine, the light meringue, its egg whites whisked to peaks,
baked at a low heat until dry and sweet, nearly nothing.
Pastel, they sat in ordered rows. I leaned
towards them, my greedy palm printing the glass.
I can still hear the patterned floor as it split,
see the flat shelves, so cared for and so careful, unsettled now and shifting.
How the great case faltered, its four feet unsteady,
the cakes tilting forward, their sugared skins smearing
its clear window with pink roses, birthday wishes.
Thinking first, It is my fault. Then, I am falling.
How to feed them by hand
Begin slowly. Arrive in the early hours when,
in the near light, everything is yet possible.
Let them see you. Then leave.
The next day, near dawn, stand by the feeder,
hold yourself still. Show yourself part
of that scenery and fade. Later and again,
offer only your hand, the striped seeds
in your palm, hot from a wool glove.
They are hungry, will take what
you give. You have wondered, have watched,
heard through the glass, their din-to have them close
and delicate, their pronged feet round
a finger, blunt beaks at your skin:
is it like flight, their rush of blood?
Bright burgundy brushes past, just beyond you.
January 2011 | back-issues, poetry
Prohibited
Remember the power of a single nail to talk to an obstinate wall.
Men act as a safety issue.
He has worked under the cheek.
Turn and eat! Turn and shout!
But do not worry, do not worry: the spirits of the community are trying to protect his fingers.
They learn that the secrets of the true diameter cannot be broken.
But your body is full wrath.
We will help you force a stubborn, but spiritual, oak.
In the study you can hear my friend.
But the dictator will eventually be lost.
Please dare to try to learn your enemy.
I caught a heavy cold.
If the sink was buried in a damaged and repellent beard.
We are all paid within inches of hearing of prisoners in winter.
Strike! Strike! Drive from the bees.
He was found dead of smoke.
The victim is not your problem, large or small.
The word most often heard words:
Onions, fish, the first question, why you did not hear me complain.
Primarily
As first waves crash over first faces
We realize the desk’s purpose has been compromised
By our growth. You are more than you were.
We’re looking for the right translation, but you have to turn around.
It’s the question of whether it just keeps extending in space
Or stops because you stop. But its lack of life
Offers life to another in the future
(he can keep calling that stone my stone) if you get my meaning.
We must conceive it thusly, because to do otherwise
Would be to deny the orchestra its due (they take an obligatory bow)
And it will surely be remembered that
Not a few men have been killed by trumpets to the head.
I’m watching the spray.
I’ve thought about what hat you will wear.
It’s the only thing on my mind.
You wake, at first, in the clothes of ideas
And settle finally, fitfully, into
The rushing of traffic on early rain.
January 2011 | back-issues, poetry
Emergency Room
The receptionist is calm.
An old woman
is trying to vomit
behind a figured curtain.
A white wimpled nun
slides by
automatic door
closes without sound
against rubber bumpers.
Squeal of burned baby
rises to dog whistle soundlessness
behind another curtain.
Two security guards in tight Hessian blue,
pistols on hips,
walk around a supine third
who lies,
chest bare black against white bandages,
on cold chrome trolley
for x-rays.
It is 12:32 A. M.
and the doctor is explaining test results
to the ear
of a beige push-button phone.
Pain sits in straight-backed chairs,
crouches on couch cushions,
holds its guts
before ambulance entrance,
raves in a draped alcove,
waits to vanish
one way or another.
Explorer
The man who had never eaten spaghetti,
hard to believe,
of course,
was nevertheless eager to try.
“How do you do it?” he said
to anyone willing to answer.
Ordinary to some,
it looked formidable to him,
strings coiled in whiteness
with blood sauce
like a tangle of tape worms.
Someone said around a smile,
wrap it in the tines,
twirl it to submission.
Cut it,
end to end,
another friend suggested
or just
suck it up.
Dog History
There is only pavement here.
Odors float, invisible cirrus,
from weeds in cracks
between stones or from dried urine
disappearing except to dog’s scent.
No dog is naked, although
unclothed they present
buttocks to the sun
and consider genitalia
of chance acquaintances.
Without past, each writes
present with raised leg
or natural squat tickled
by grass or capricious winds.
No heaven waits perfection of dogs
but other dogs
sniffing, running, eating.
