In the expanse of
green grass like the sea, the wind
murmuring like surf
in the trees, why only one
child swinging in the playground?
copyright 2012 Ujjvala Bagal Rahn
The philosophers of the air.
All we want is to be free.
Let Gryffindor skewer,
Slytherin offer the ring to kiss,
and Hufflepuff sup.
Really, we don’t even need the diadem
anymore than the bird needs clothes.
Leave us to our books, our astrolabe,
our telescope and the glass ceiling
showing us the changing sky.
Let us think what we like,
free as pen on paper,
free as meditation,
free as solitude,
free as the journals we write,
free as a day without schedule,
free as natural hair,
free as nakedness,
free as waiting for a poem to filter in like the mist.
Not for us the romance of possessions that possess us,
the jewelry of prison chains.
copyright 2012 Ujjvala Bagal Rahn
Ninjas are cowards,
assassins have no honor,
but the samurai faces
the enemy, says Usha,
a daughter of Kshatriya.
copyright 2012 Ujjvala Bagal Rahn
“There’s no substitute for Momma”
“There is no substitute for Momma.”
Workaholic if it’s a profession; Mom if not.
Bulging with possibility, we waddle along,
picking the theme of the nursery, the curtains,
the daycare, or the stay-at=home routine,
the school, the clothes, perfect, perfect,
and our formulas, or our nursing schedule,
the classes they’ll go to.
Ready for the rush of a little body toward us,
we think, the perfumed clean scent,
changing to the dirty diaper and soil stink
that we plop in the tub on time,
the schoolwork we hover over,
the phones we give, the clothes we give,
the time we wait at one lesson
after another. The job, our real job.
All we talk about: our kids, what they’ve done
to our budgets, their good grades.
It’s real, this life, we insist, it’s important
that we talk about our children.
As to other thoughts of other things,
we keep that to ourselves.
2012 copyright Ujjvala Bagal Rahn
Haiku
Hardy roses
bloom yet again, scarlet lips
on the lawn’s green face.
2012 copyright Ujjvala Bagal Rahn
Tanka
On my sacred tray
sit gleaming silver Lakshmi,
smooth alabaster Shiva,
and heavy bronze Ganesh,
but taller than those three, the
wooden red mortal, Buddha.
2012 copyright Ujjvala Bagal Rahn
After talking with Vaiju, I’ve decided to also create a poem each day in April. Here’s my first three:
April 5, 2012
Japanese Words I’ve Learned Watching “Naruto”
Shinitso
Dantuine
Demo
Si
Strength
Hope
But
Death
copyright 2012 Joseph R. Demare
April 6, 2012
I spent today engulfed in a white haze.
Spray, from a saw blade, cooled with water
The white blocks of ceramic
resting on the rolling table
as I shape them into smaller blocks
smaller, smaller, and thinner
The spray, leaving a white coating,
encasing every hair on my arm,
A white powder remaining,
filling every pore
Turning my hair grey,
filling the curls.
A white haze from which no dream can escape
only the whining blade
the deafening grinding
and endless blocks of white ceramic
copyright 2012 Joseph R. Demare
April 7, 2012
I am still in mourning this morning
The yellow rays of dawn
find me sitting at a table
surrounded by a semi-circle
of big baskets filled with flowers
purple, white, red, and yellow
My dining room still smells like
a funeral home.
It is almost two weeks since
my lover’s mother took her last breath.
“Quick and shallow” reported her sister
as we arrived “too late.”
Our slow dash to her bedside interrupted by
a hundred tiny things such that
we missed that last act of life.
But her wrinkled arm was still warm
to the touch, and now it’s hard not
to be burdened by sadness when these
flowers wait so patiently, nodding
at every movement I’m making,
at every stroke of my pen.
But the sunbeams are now soft
but white, and a hundred
tiny things demand my attention
because my days are probably not
yet at an end.
copyright 2012 Joseph R. Demare
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