Mountain View Poets' Society

ONOMATOPOEIA
Gwen Eisenmann

Touch can be an ouch
for a quick flick,
or a thump on the rump
with a thick stick,
or a tender tap
and a tickle and squeeze
from a squirming tot
giggling to please.

CONSULTATION
Gwen Eisenmann

Am I ready now?
Have I learned enough
to write the picture
of an "old lady" (that's what
children call me, but
they don't know what old is)--
an old lady learning
what wise is?

This vast cosmic self
goes on its way
in vehicle after vehicle
without consulting me.
That much I've learned
and welcome the idea
of surprise. If that's wise,
it's knowing we continue.

As for consultation,
perhaps in writing down
the words of old poetry,
remembering the feeling
of dreams, I'll recall
what was given, not asked
but recorded, to be read.

It's my own script I'm consulting!

OLD HOUSE
Dale Ernst

Driving through the Ozark hill country,
I come upon one of those old abandoned houses
that I often see.

I see it standing there,
deserted, falling in, the chimney still
standing straight though made of native stone.

Pulling into the driveway, I notice a rosebush
by the corner of the front porch just starting
to bloom.

Walking up to the yard fence--
can't help but wander back in time.

Is that a young man carrying his bride
over that rough hewn threshold, and
perhaps the sound of a charivari?

Then comes the sound of children at
play and a mother yelling from the kitchen,
come in its suppertime.

A young man in a uniform hugging his
parents goodbye, and a teenage girl with a
tall boy, looking back as she closes the gate.

Summer evening--two old folks sitting on the
front-porch swing, a light breeze ruffling their silver hair.
The light is starting to fade. I better be on my way.

Looking back--just the old house standing there--
not quite so forlorn as I drive away.

CHORUS
Gwendolyn Eisenmann

"I can't hear myself think,"
Mother used to say
when we were noisy children.
It wasn't the thoughts so much
as the loss of self to think them.

Now, alone, walking a woodsy lane
at dusk, everything stilled but katydids,
hearing myself think, the sounds
are all of others, the parts of me
that they have become.

MOBIUS POEM
Bruce Carr

In my delusions of you
Not only could I feel the damp breeze
But I could smell it as well, seeping

Through the cracked window
Scent of rain and apple blossoms
Deluging the room, somehow

I perceive the white fire
Of distant stars and as yet
Unexplored planets, lacking

Even rudimentary knowledge
Of you, your heart or mind
Still I boarded that flight, reveling

TOMATO FIELDS
Faye Gregory

The tall tomato plants
staked neatly in long rows
        in California
        went for mile,
        after mile,
        after mile,
till I was amazed—
thinking of all the
salads they would make!

REFLECTION
Faye Gregory

Lazy hot summer day,
Squatting on a big rock,
Line and hook dangling.

Big perch eyeing squiggly worm,
Debating the tempting morsel,
Me anticipating sizzling perch.

Trudging dusty road home
At end of long day,
Small string of fish...heavy.

Sunbaked or fried,
Similar, but I'm alive...barely,
And the fish are frying in the pan.

DEPARTING
Dale Ernst

Departing from the post—
going everywhere at once,
but really nowhere at all.

Then coming back to
the same spot.

These different points
of departure—leaving at
different times,

landing at different points
on the map.

Sometime drifting with others,
sometimes not.

RECURSION
(Beth Hykes)

The pen, a conveyance,
tender of intention,
consequences unannounced.
The page, a mirror
silvered in a moment,
a reflective veneer
behind the beginning,
before the unseen end.
This flake of pulp
bonding words
one to another
amplifies
what it cannot hear.
This quill indites
what it cannot see.
And I, contemplating
this lamination,
words to paper,
meaning to ink,
complete the recursion
again, and again,
and again.

SINS OF THE FATHER
Michelle Martin

I am angry, praying still,
My entreaties ignored seven years.
Faith and belief, trusting Your will,
Enough time to baptize my child in tears.

My entreaties ignored, seven years,
Time enough for the sins of the father . . .
Enough time to baptize my child in tears,
Fighting Your judgment, alone, a mother.

Time enough for the sins of the father,
I finally left, already too late.
Fighting Your judgment, alone a mother.
Seven years of devotion, too long to wait.

I finally left, already too late.
His father's poison swallowed the son.
Seven years of devotion, too long to wait.
Lost father, lost son, lives undone.

His father's poison swallowed the son.
Alone, I light candles for my sin.
Lost father, lost son, lives undone,
Bereft, I plead for my son again.

Alone, I light candles for my sin,
Your silence complete, until
Bereft, I plead for my son again.
I am angry, praying still.

ACCIDENT
Gordon Johnston

The shatter of glass,
metal crunch:

a dam bursts
and night floods in.

So much is
swept away

but I am left

and when I wake
these white walls are

like the sun.

RIVER ROCKS
Faye Gregory

The sun beats down, leaving
my body warm, fuzzy, drowsy,
lulled by rippling waters over
the rocks, soft sounds of insects,
birds chattering in the forest
nearby, while my eyes search
for that special treasure to carry
home, a miniature mountain
full of unique holes like little
caves made by centuries of
dripping water, shiny quartz
that sparkles so nice, ones laden
with moss, ones that will look
just right in a pretty rock garden.