Friendship Like Feathers: November poems

As November comes to a close here in Bend, Oregon, I am settling into the shorter days, frosty mornings, and cozy mornings in the way of birds fluffing up their feathers to stay warm. Please enjoy my latest collection of poems I’ve penned as part of an ekphrastic poetry group–writing poems inspired by paintings or photographs. As always, nature weaves through them all. I am grateful for the revision suggestions from a talented and giving group of poets.

Friendship Like Feathers
After Lisel Mueller, “Love Like Salt”

Downy upon breasts, pillowing hearts
whenever they fracture.

Interlacing like barbs and barbules
smoothed, preened, and entwining.

Floating and wafting on a teasing breeze,
always the quilted landing.

Patterned in our unfolding lives.

Iridescent as every reunion.

Dipping hollow quills into ink,
we loop letters of confidences.

Hovering above a rippled pond or
plunging headfirst into desire

Every flight an uplift, every landing
an enfolding.

The Window

Shrouded crimson suede walls
weighted burgundy wingback chair
faced away from lone window
framing verdurous trees whistling

cardinal riffs blocked by glass,
Cheer cheer cheer Birdie birdie
birdie. Each slurred note a swaying
poppy hummed by honeybees

as the unliving room weeps
ruby tears raining on rose carpet
reflected in cerise oval mirror
petaled in scarlet rose bouquet.

I find no comfort in upright
furniture stained garnet sweat
soaked pained conversations,
too many trappings, so little honesty

over tea and biscuits, white-gloved hands
proper etiquette, tight-fitting bodices
while outside the arced window, true
living swirls flowing, flinging abandon

bare feet, dirty fingernails, cherry kisses
breaking every rule.

This poem is a form called “haibun”– a prose poem followed by a haiku. When I saw this lovely art of the Matterhorn by one of my favorite artists (since writing a big report about him in sixth grade at Westtown Friends School), I tumbled back into a memory. (And yes, I did love the book Heidi).

Matterhorn Haibun

Summer before fourth grade after moving again to a new place, a lonely girl sketches a lofty snowy Matterhorn. She scribbles her dream home. A stream skips right through a stone cottage and a tall tree pierces a thatched roof. An adoring collie frolics by her side in a wildflower meadow. Then she adds Peter who holds her hand while herding his goats with bells tinkling. Two stick figures. So far from here by the Coulee Dam. Company town. A concrete mountain plugging the Columbia River. Sagebrush winds. Orderly trees. Straight blocks. One-story houses plotted out. Reaching for a pink crayon, she shades the sky in alpenglow.

Skywise Matterhorn
tucks worries in rose-tinted mist
softens the coming storms

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I could only write this poem below after our dog Pepper recovered from being very ill over Thanksgiving break. Wes and I took turns sleeping by her side at night as we contemplated the unthinkable of her leaving us–too soon.

When you are sick

If you were a swan curving
your weary slender neck
over streaming feathers
pluming your pain

I would preen every silky
vane for you. Align all 25,000
feathers, readying you
for flight.

I am not ready to keen
your swan song. Please end
this nightmare streaked
in whorled blood.

I curl my body around
your black furry dog self
growing weaker.

Where is the Pepper we know?
Leaping labrador. River plunger.
Trail sprinter. Eager eater. Gentle
sweetheart.

World at a standstill.
Nothing matters. Only
your stuttering heartbeat,
my head on your chest.

Certainty of the Varied Thrush

That same dream. Walking naked
among startled strangers,

lost in a labyrinth
of dim stale hallways.

Open my eyes to this certainty.
Pastel dawn triangulating
location. My home.

Raven roughing up
first light,

gravelly crooner
mapping the treetops.

I rise. Dress in pajamas. Relief
of cotton curtaining vulnerable
human skin.

Coffee. Journal. Pen.
Perched here by the window,

a curtain of glass separating
me from frost

as a Varied Thrush flips
over leaves papering ashy soil
under naked lilac limbs.

Certain in his robin-like hopping.
Certain in his bold black necklace,

his pumpkin gown. Bandit mask.
Fiery stripe above polished brown eye

until the Sharp-shinned Hawk
swoops down. Barred wings and tail
flaring danger.

Keen yellow eyes seeking songbirds.
Hunger is certain.

Thrush thrums to safety. Flurry
of junco, chickadee, nuthatch, and goldfinch.
Scattering wings. All seeking refuge.

No certainty in this world. Even
For a Varied Thrush.

What am I waiting for?
Flip over every leaf.