Medea
What mother has not thought
in the secret passges
of her mind
"flee for the hills
or kill the bastards.
any way to be free"
the brothers are fighting again
“Mermeros got the fat
and I got none”
“Phereses ate the eyes
and I got none”
these little Jasons
want to conquer her body
breasts and arms
to snatch all the meat
from the soup-pot
she can scarce breathe
in the cave's close heat
she is hungry
she is a single mother
in hiding
taking the blade
she slits their throats
in their afternoon naps
she prays their final dreams
are of a joy
unrelated to conquest
moments later
a fist in the uterus
a limb cut off
she will regret
what cannot be undone
prop them up again
and they fall over
stitch on the heads
it will not work
her healing is done
riding a dragon
rising over princely burial mounds
she will rise
to the moniker
given her
Wiced Medea,
who has no home
but will always have a name
Lucy Simpson
Seattle
7/2008
]]>Dear Neighbors,
Please join me in extending a hearty welcome to Erc http://erc675.vox.com/. His poetry is excellent! Please pop over to see his work. His Kindergarten poem is particularly lovely. I'd publish his work were I an editor.
Lucy, who enjoyed the Seattle thunder showers
]]>Songbird Sounds
His girl is a sooty hearth;
Igniting her jaw, he wishes her well.
Her teeth less restrained than the soil that chokes him,
She'll move to sedate him until rage screams, far pent.
But she'll claim a mountain for him,
Turning fingers to fists at lowly peaks.
She blows grains from the hourglass;
He skips 'round the clock.
He hums, a mother at wit's end;
Her linens soak salty as lines entice her ear.
His story obscured, electrical, sullied,
He'll wander the mountains, writhe with song.
But he'll vow a garden for her,
Then swallow the earth that preserves her pulse.
Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note
By Amiri Baraka
Lately, I've become accustomed to the way
The ground opens up and envelopes me
Each time I go out to walk the dog.
Or the broad edged silly music the wind
Makes when I run for a bus...
Things have come to that.
And now, each night I count the stars.
And each night I get the same number.
And when they will not come to be counted,
I count the holes they leave.
Nobody sings anymore.
And then last night I tiptoed up
To my daughter's room and heard her
Talking to someone, and when I opened
The door, there was no one there...
Only she on her knees, peeking into
Her own clasped hands
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Evolution
the gecko curls his feet
in fetal bliss
wax-worm-fed
eyes shuttered against the light
like when he sat in his egg
content in warm goo
dreaming nothingness
and then a light
cracking through
calling him
to break the shell
and struggle out
a hungering
you too passed through ages
in mother's womb
floating in bliss
a lumpy egg
lizard-tailed
pig-snouted
you looked like swine
before you assumed
your primate shape
little skinny monkey
wrinkled
pale as an onion
or the moon
depending on mother's
hormonal moods
Lucy Simpson
Seattle
7/1/2008
He is the man few have seen.
He works alone
in stockrooms or as a night watchman
guarding unwanted things.
He is never behind the counter
nor in the kitchen.
He is the man
who has the social skills
to fill containers and racks.
Occasionally
he is found in defunct depots
that have long since
been depleted of function.
Inexplicable sightings
in forgotten corners
give him a mythical life,
a twilight existence
that leaves
foot shaped shadows
where it has crossed
our small-minded paths.
(C) Eric Ashford June 08
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written on the wall
http://metaphorsandwings.googlepages.com/kinder
Often I feel like the youngest
in an eternal kindergarten, then
an ancient oak tree will turn toward me
suddenly as windswept and familiar
as a younger brother.
Old men smile like children;
their faces are snapshots of my son
as a boy, a teenager, a man.
Any mother could be my mother
or daughter depending upon stance, glance,
the way kindness is sheltered or exposed
in her bosom.
A cat warming itself in the sun
looks like an old flame---still not out.
A groundhog reminds me of a roving uncle
a black sheep coming home.
Parents come back as offspring
friends as small birds
that sing of things too great
for small birds to understand.
I look upon my cousin Mort
being led by a child
down a street on a leash.
I look upon this nursery for giants
and I know
that I have read this story before.
It is the tale of the kinder.
The wide eyed kinder
who rear us every day as their own
while we live among them
as strangers.
(C) Eric Ashford June 08
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