options for a cold winter day

The Only Flag                                                   

Our mornings indict us.
I have seen it in your eyes,
stark as streets swarm
with sterile savages.

I have no one but you
& you none but me--
& Baby the mathematics of it
are frightening.

Let's go back to bed
lie down together
& forget our fears,
hearts pounding
to the rhythm of love

    & your flaming hair
our banner
for that brief moment.

    - William Hawkins   (  Ottawa poet  )

....

Entering The Virgin's Heart

A mother came to mould … limbs like ours.
                        — Gerard Manley Hopkins












She was born without hands;
her feet made music on harp strings,
each toe-pluck sounding with
the confidence of a dancer’s pose.


How quickly it was
she saw surety and beauty,
as she gazed upon the statue of Mary
and entered into the Virgin’s heart.


Afterward she insisted
that standing en pointe
on moss on the cliff’s craggy edge—
like the picture that hung in Grace’s kitchen,
but with rounded nubs
instead of the usual long, slender fingers—


is perfect worship.






                          Helen Losse












......

tools

Tell me, how do the manufacturers of tools
turn a profit? I have used the same clawed hammer
for forty years. The screwdriver misted with rust
once slipped into my young hand, a new householder's.
Obliviously, tools wait to be used: the pliers,
notched mouth agape like a cartoon shark's; the wrench
with its jaws on a screw; the plane still sharp enough
to take its fragrant, curling bite; the brace and bit
still fit to chew a hole in pine like a patient thought;
the tape rule, its inches unaltered though I have shrunk;
the carpenter's angle, still absolutely right though I
have strayed; the wooden bubble level from my father's
meagre horde. Their stubborn shapes pervade the cellar,
enduring with a thrift that shames our wastrel lives.










                                           John Updike


























.....

State of Mind

NORTH DAKOTA

east

the whole moon

burns behind jamestown

seven wings of geese

light the thin ice

west

the asian sun

bloody on the interstate

spring flowers

break on the gray prairie

exit

fingerprints

on the rearview mirror

feral shadows

transposed near fargo

               - Gerald Vizenor

.

always room for a ghazal

                    




                       What of It   ?                                            




                          Nesimi


                          

I myself took up the cloak of blame;
I smashed the bottle of honour and virtue on a stone.
        What of it?

Sometimes I rise up and watch the universe from above,
sometimes I go down to earth and lose myself in love.
        What of it?

Sometimes I study life’s meaning in the holy books,
sometimes I go to the tavern and get drunk.
        What of it?

Sometimes I enter my garden to pick roses for my darling;
I grew those roses and I gathered them.
        What of it?

The wine of this love is a sin, the orthodox think--
The sin is mine, I fill my glass and drink.
        What of it?

The pious bow to the niche in the mosque;
I bow at the Beloved’s doorstep, pressing my face up close.
        What of it?

My enemy says loving beauty is sinful.
I love my beloved so I’ll gladly pay that price.
        What of it?

They ask Nesimi,
are you and your beloved getting along?
Whether we get along or not, my Beloved is mine.
        What of it?






    

translated by Latif Bolat and Jennifer Ferraro

a toast

        Wherever the Catholic sun doth shine,

There’s always laughter and good red wine.

                    At least I’ve always found it so.

                                   Benedicamus Domino!

― Hilaire Belloc

life to be drunken in

So many are alive who don’t seem to care.

Casual, easy, they move in the world

As though untouched.

But you take pleasure in the faces

Of those who know they thirst.

You cherish those

Who grip you for survival.

You are not dead yet, it’s not too late

To open your depths by plunging into them

And drink in the life

That reveals itself quietly there.

                                     Ranier Maria Rilke