Wednesday, February 10, 2016

February 10 - Grace Marie Grafton

Spring equinox

What gets made in early spring,
before the gold columns of summer
grow fat and bully
the crones of change into surrender?
A thousand circles of etiquette
usher next-of-kin into
the ceremony of upheaval.
The contained no longer
submits, each mote
seeks its own sway.
The yellow witch of the east
(oh, can you see
her snakes race before her?)
stirs up the humus, foments
rebellion, demands sex.
And she is so beautiful,
so beautiful, what in this world
would deny her?

                   to Julie L. Khan's "Closer"

Tuesday, February 9, 2016

February 9 -- Grace Marie Grafton

Gold trees

This is where she stood
with her imperfect vision refusing
to wear glasses she trusted
something bending into
her the way water
bends the body's image. 
She wanted to paint this
part of the morning even though
it meant surrendering 
much of her vocabulary
the way the sea wind blurs
palm fronds together,
the way the sea
charms the depths into
fishlessness. Whatever she knew
blended, not exactly the way
red fallen maple leaves
lie in November at the bottom
of the fish pond, 
clumped over each other,
December sediment a dank
speckled breath where the leaves
were. What is her vision
worth? The blackbirds rise
out of the alfalfa field
first as individual
birds then as a kind of
moving blot, negative
against the sky whose color
is indistinguishable.
Someday she will place
her hand on the canvas
and paint that part of the picture
on her skin, when she raises
it off she will see the outline
of her true form.

                      to Patricia Friend's "44th St. Hill"

Monday, February 8, 2016

February 8 -- Grace Marie Grafton

The Womb

To enter the heat of that room,
undress slowly and watch her
edges disappear. She dreamed about
gold and how hard you must press
into the earth to open the vein.
At first it seemed easy, a magic
finger pointed in the right direction
between two eyes and the bones
of the pelvis. Then she realized
it took years of practice to find the opening
and how to operate the drill.
To empty, sit and apply the veil.
First she couldn't look into
the light even underground it was
too blinding. She feared it would never
let her go, wanted to say at the last
minute (before the floor broke through
and everything began to rush),
"Wait, I haven't thought it through."
 
                          to   Diane Darrow, "Womb Wonder"

Sunday, February 7, 2016

February 7 -- Thomas Thomas

Paul Klee Cat and Bird

bird nests
above the cat's eye
free in danger

-----

Piet Mondrian White Rose in a Glass

rose drinking its last
draught of life - bathed within
severe orange fire

-----

Frederic Edwin Church The iceberg

tiny ship towered
over by small iceberg
in little ocean

insignificant planet
speck of solar system

-----

Edgar Degas Laundry Girls Ironing

to cloud the pain
hasten the rush to death
escape life

-----

Pablo Picasso Le Vieux Roi

power distorts
turns beauty - satisfaction
unobtainable

-----

Georges Seurat Angelica at the rock (After ingres)

in this shame
eternity dressed
with your wealth

-----

Blake's prints on Milton's Paradise Lost

Satan watches
Adam and Eve adoring embrace
Jealous of love

Saturday, February 6, 2016

February 6 -- Don Kingfisher Campbell

Source of inspiration:

Photographers and titles of their photos:
1)      Paul Souders “The Luckiest Penguin”
2)      Scott Marmer “Leap of Faith”
3)      Alex Varani “The Boxer and Its Eggs”
4)      Emmanuel Rondeau “Rhino Bodyguards”
5)      Graham McGeorge “Master of Disguise”
6)      Morgan Heim “Beast in the Garden”
7)      Paul Souders “The Ice Bear”
8)      Pal Hermansen “Attack”
9)      Ray Collins “Snow-Capped Mountain”
10)  Ben Cranke “Reach for the Stars”
11)  Luciano Candisani “Sustainable But Threatened”
12)  Josh Anon “Aurora Over Lagoon”
13)  Todd Bretl “Bobtail Summetry”
14)  Emanuel Biggi “Curvy king”
15)  Russell Laman “Seals On Iceberg”


On a Planet Where

A penguin leaps away from a seal

A wildebeest jumps into a river

A boxer crab belly holds its hundred orange eggs

A white rhinoceros is protected by rifle-toting soldiers

An owl blends into a tree’s bark

A mountain lion nighthunts a wood-decked backyard

A polar bear dives between ice floes

A taloned sparrowhawk attacks a jay

An ocean wave mistaken for a snow-capped mountain

Bare trees like zombies reach up at night to the stars

A goggled boy floats in clear shallow ocean seeking starfish to place in his lipped plastic bowl

An aurora borealis streaks pink over an icy blue lagoon

A bobtail squid has eight curling symmetrical arms lined with nodules

A hook-horned Alpine ibex stares down from a cliff ledge

Seals sleep on an iceberg in Antarctica

Some humans internet search for nature photos to post on their Facebook feeds

Friday, February 5, 2016

February 5 -- Kathleen McClung

Carol Greene, Self-Portrait, 2009
 
You paint not troubled souls but harmony:
Calm, bare-armed girl, first flute. Gray-goateed man
in white shirt, humming, burps a grandbaby.
You smile in aqua turtleneck. I can
imagine how you tucked your photograph
beside this canvas, looked long, listened, chose
a slender brush, embarked on song of self:
One shadowed cheek, one bright. Peach hues for nose.
Reflected glints in oval lenses. Eyes—
like Alice’s, like mine— the useful blue
of ocean, sky, and wing that shimmer, rise,
and blur beyond your studio, same blue
as backdrop cradling white crown, each wrinkle, fold
of flesh. New, lilting hymn to women’s faces, old.
 
Previously published as Sonnet 7 of “Lighter than Her Lace: A Crown of Borrowed Self-Portraits” in Unsplendid’s July 2014 double issue on women and form 5.3 + 6.1 www.unsplendid.com
Carol Greene lives and paints in San Jose, California. Her portraits may be viewed at www.carolgreene.org/home/paintings

Thursday, February 4, 2016

February 4 -- Kathleen McClung

Behind the White Bird
     after Tatiana Lyskova’s painting, “White Bird,” 2008
 
Which one of us
holds tighter—you,
timid cockatiel, tall
as a snowman, crown
of green tendrils
curving above our heads?
 
Or me,
ruby red party dress
spraying past
my hairless thighs
into our kaleidoscope
of a room?
 
Entranced, claw
to wrist, I give you
a secret name,
whisper into your ear
a charm, a promise
I will break.
 
One palm
sinks in feathers,
the other, chiffon.
My lips, for now, press
only your white pillow skull.
We do not fly or sing.
 
 Previously published in Ekphrasis, Fall/Winter 2013
“White Bird” may be viewed at www.tatianalyskova.com
 
Kathleen McClung is the author of Almost the Rowboat (Finishing Line Press, 2013) and her award-winning work appears widely in journals and anthologies. She teaches at Skyline College and the Writing Salon and serves as judge for the sonnet category of the Soul-Making Keats literary competition. A native of California, she lives in San Francisco. www.kathleenmcclung.com