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TABLE OF CONTENTS

XVI:2 June, 2001

LYNX 
A Journal for Linking Poets 

 
   
  SOLO WORKS OF
GHAZALS:
WATCHING THE 101 SOUTH by Korie Beth Brown; AFTER THE READING, ORGAN-EYESED WATER, BROKEN POTTERY SCRIPT by
Jane Reichhold;

HAIBUN:
EATON CANYON AT NOON by Korie Beth Brown; YEW-TREES by Paul T. Conneally; IF YOU'RE EVER IN WHITE RIVER JUNCTION by
Larry Kimmel; DIVING FOR TURTLES by Gary LeBel; A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A TEA STUDENT IN KYOTO by Giselle Maya; TOUCH AND GO 11/17 by marlene mountain ; LAGGING LEFT, MANTRA BREAKS ME, SHE WOULD LACK, LIFE WOULD SUFFICE, WHEN I PLAY MUSIC I PLAY by Sheila Murphy; MAY I HAVE THIS DANCE? by Rod Thompson; PIGEON MOUNTAIN by
Linda Ward ; PUR,
SPRAY SAY, LAST AWAY, LANG by
John M. Bennett
; SWIM OF A NARRATIVE by
Werner Reichhold;

SIJO by: 
gino peregrini;
Kirsty Karkow
; Elizabeth St Jacques

TANKA by:
David Bachelor; VISION QUEST by Edward Baranosky;  TIDELINES by
Tony Beyer; Korie Beth Brown;
!LOCAL HISTORY by Guillermo Compte Cathcart;
Thomas P. Clausen; Maggi Sullivan Godman; A RED ARROW by
Elizabeth Howard;
Kirsty Karkow; Larry Kimmel; Joann Klontz; DEMENTIA SERIES by
Thelma Mariano; RED LOTUS by
Autumn Palumbo; THE BALLAD by
Carol Purington
; TANKA: by
R K Singh; Maria Steyn; Elizabeth St Jacques,
Marc Thompson; Rod Thompson; Jane E. Wilson

 

 

   

 GHAZALS

WATCHING THE 101 SOUTH
Korie Beth Brown

The hills drop away. Skyscrapers materialize.
Los Angeles comes into view.

Yesterday, it was Easter Sunday. Today
I am no longer surrounded by eggs.

Last year, I was thirty-something. Next year
I'll live in a different decade.

The country station dwindles. Rap emerges.
The freeway gains another lane.

The Backstreet Boys are this years' collective
Heartthrob. 
Does anyone remember New Kids on the Block?

President Clinton is no longer President.
A second George Bush has gained the office.

An hour ago, our car flew south.
Now we travel the speed of "one car per green light."

I once owned a bike with a Banana seat and white basket.
Now my bike is for fitness cycling.

In another fifty years, will "Korie Beth Brown"
Be remembered by other aspiring writers?

 

AFTER THE READING
Jane Reichhold

bagels gone into the shape of their centers
energy dispersed in weaving webs well

when the lights close the ringing room
with whorls of spray softened to mottled gray

crumbs lie on the floor with the early fears
haphazardly syllabic in close to perfect rhyme

where applause arced, pivoted, rose and slipped
back into the white circled faces of cups

squared chairs sleep in the attitude of listening
cotton threads that caressed the button boxes

sage stones clatter from the slopes of the mesas
hawk feathers flare as dust is lowered by raindrops

women return to their bodies whole and renewed
age-spotted and vaguely trembling over that one

I watch them slip into the waist of red gym trunks
small books for their fingers that sparkle - sparkle

too full of ideas for one swollen heart that bends
fine hands outstretched with her bowing

a stifled roiling groan to shatter the coldest cold
a face turned as air vibrates with thrills unfolding

the gorge returns to the owls and drumming
and the flesh was beaten – pounded to a pulp

as a date on the calendar rolled into the sun
Jane returned to the speechlessness of words.

 

ORGAN-EYESED WATER
Jane Reichhold

a thousand stirring wings find their way into the air
scrape and tarnish your hands in the cottonwoods

a dark vision of you buying me coffee and muffins
the limits of consecutive grammar remain muted, even startled

strolling through the museum of rotted wood and dust
when we are changed into minnows within a river

for these reasons I reach across the knife point's voice
while the foolish greenhouses of women soak in cold milk

their bones stiffen into skulls of roses as the boat
of the blue one touches the red one's stomach

you lie down between two pillows of broken rhythms
reach to stroke a brow and press against your lover's face

automotive taillights, something that cups the plates the napkins
before realizing that other people also have emotions

clouded as if painted by El Greco such a baroque evening
when all the living fluids swirl within the hiding

every draft begins in the serenity of tomorrow
but Jane insists on the resistance of hold habits

 

BROKEN POTTERY SCRIPT
Jane Reichhold

white paper's sun glare
fight raper's sin stare

the Rorschach shape of desire
dragged away by distance

to translate pottery shards
would that be too exciting?

would you walk beside me
without floating up on wings

rings of words carried aloft
by flowers' fragrance on my porch

fanned out in blooming
like a woman hot and panting

I cannot hold the pencil any longer

 

HAIBUN

EATON CANYON AT NOON
Korie Beth Brown

Today, Eaton Canyon is green and brown, the sky above it blue and white. Yesterday's storm may not be quite over; the wind continues to pick up and wind down in oddly measured beats, neither rhythmical nor cacophonic. The streams are pregnant with water rushing down the gorge. 

Like most parts of natural Los Angeles, Eaton Canyon is not quite riparian and not quite desert: the rushing stream that I now jump across will dry completely up in one or two short months. In an El Nino year, flash floods destroy everything in the gully. This is not an El Nino year; it is wetter than most years, but the rain itself has arrived in a steady stream of storms rather than in one or two "Pineapple Expresses." Today, small trees grow in the streambed without being uprooted by the water. 

Below the water, the stones glisten where they've been scattered in the mud. Above the water, swallows dip and rise, seeking bugs to be eaten mid-air. They will soon get fat and sassy; there are more bugs today than I've ever seen here. Lizards scamper away from the water, seeking heat from the dry section of the riverbed. Everything here measures itself by its relationship to water - where it rests, how it eats, whether it will be here next year. We walk slowly, distracted by the smell of chaparral and the colors of early spring.

Fragrant sage snapping 
Under my exploring feet
This April morning;
In September, the streambed
will be completely dry.

YEW-TREES
William Wordsworth, Shiki and Paul T. Conneally

There is a Yew-tree, pride of Lorton Vale, 
Which to this day stands single, in the midst
Of its own darkness, as it stood of yore;
Not loth to furnish weapons for the bands
Of Umfraville or Percy ere they marched
To Scotland's heaths; or those that crossed the sea
And drew their sounding bows at Azincour,
Perhaps at earlier Crecy, or Poictiers.
Of vast circumference and gloom profound
This solitary Tree! a living thing
Produced too slowly ever to decay;
Of form and aspect too magnificent
To be destroyed. But worthier still of note
Are those fraternal Four of Borrowdale,
Joined in one solemn and capacious grove;
Huge trunks! and each particular trunk a growth
Of intertwisted fibres serpentine
Up-coiling, and inveterately convolved;
Nor uninformed with Phantasy, and looks
That threaten the profane;--a pillared shade,
Upon whose grassless floor of red-brown hue,
By sheddings from the pining umbrage tinged
Perennially--beneath whose sable roof
Of boughs, as if for festal purpose, decked
With unrejoicing berries--ghostly Shapes
May meet at noontide; Fear and trembling Hope,
Silence and Foresight; Death the Skeleton
And Time the Shadow;--there to celebrate,
As in a natural temple scattered o'er
With altars undisturbed of mossy stone,
United worship; or in mute repose
To lie, and listen to the mountain flood
Murmuring from Glaramara's inmost caves.

William Wordsworth     1803.

Shiki - Paul T Conneally

a Yew-tree 
standing in its own 
darkness 

you notice him
in a crowded room
everyone does
we were so much alike
he even shared my make-up

a young man
standing in his own
darkness

solitary tree 
of vast circumference 
evening shadows 

he stayed with me
for the first few months
but then he left
a man like him needs space
we live in one bedroom

solitary boy
in the shopping mall
a few loose coins

pillared shade 
four trees with huge trunks 
of intertwisted fibres 

we come here often
resting under the yew trees
on the old park bench
his dad comes sometimes
when he remembers

pillared shade
he makes this weeks rent
in the coppice

below the branches 
grassless floor of red and brown 
leaf litter 

he's a good baby
never causes a big fuss
just like his dad was
according to grandma
he can already say "dad"

below the branches
grassless floor of needles
and swabs

noon 
boughs decked with berries 
form ghostly shapes 

noon
boughs decked with berries
form ghostly shapes

 

IF YOU'RE EVER IN WHITE RIVER JUNCTION
Larry Kimmel

I'd just got into White River Junction by bus and I gave her a call. She said she'd be along in about a half-an-hour, so I crossed the street to a bar, and ordered a beer and a shot of whiskey. I was the only patron in the place. Said a few words to the bartender and poured a glass of beer and dumped the whiskey into it. And than all of a sudden I hear: "Hey! What do you think you're doing?" And just like that, the bartender grabs the glass and the bottle and dumps the whole business down the sink. "What!?", I say, and he says: "What do you mean, `what'? You don't do that in my bar." I made a helpless, questioning gesture, and he says: "Where did-ya learn that?" Catching on I say: "Everybody does it where I come from." "Well, I'm glad I don't come from there. They must all be crazy." I shrugged again. "I don't like seeing young guys like you doing that sort of thing." I don't know exactly what was said or happened next, but within a few seconds he is setting up a clean glass, bottle of beer, and a shot of good ol' Corby's, just like that, and says: "Now you drink it right. I won't have a young guy, like you, in here acting like an alki. Jesus Christ, what got you started on that anyway?" And on and on he went in that vein, as he polished glasses and racked them overhead. 

I ask you, did I look that callow? I was twenty-five and had been steadily drinking for seven years without let up, by then. 

I mean, come on now. Any bartender worth his salt should have been able to see that. I mean, I was a pro. A stone, freaking-ass, professional drinker at that point. Jeeze. And all I'd done was pour me a beer and dumped the whiskey in to make a boilermaker. And what's the freaking difference in drinking it separate or mixed? It all goes to the same place. Right?

The girl
could have done better
in White River Junction,
than run into my arms
and the set-
ting
sun.

 

DIVING FOR TURTLES
For my parents
Gary LeBel

The nape
of joy when young
never questions
from what far country
the wild geese fly

It is very hard to probe one’s deepest memories. The simpler they are, the more illusive they become. And I’m guilty as I write these words of gleaning far too much from so little. Perhaps it is the poverty of a small mind, one that measures in the scale of an inch rather than in the mile of a conqueror. But I do know that at times a conspiracy of detail erupts from life and out of its cinder cone comes enough experience to fill even a conqueror’s arrogant boots, and the shoes of a dreamer.

Is there a danger that the idea in a memory might become more alive than the thing itself? Yes. I will take that risk. After all, I have Plato on my side.

The outward trappings are meager at best: a lake, turtles offshore from an island, a boy and a boat. Approaching the special spot, the outboard motor is turned off; water laps gently on the aluminum hull; the boat drifts. He sees the turtles as they bask in the sun on fallen tree branches; the boy slips into the water quietly and approaches them from below. He is alone with the island and the lake and the turtles. Time is only an angle of the sun. The turtles plunge into the water and he gives chase without ever touching one of them intentionally. It is only a game, and the sheer joy of seeing them in graceful underwater flight is his singular desire.

Combing the bottom
in a diving mask,
a boy content
with nothing more than sunlight
dancing beautifully in water

What is the springboard of his joy? Is it the sun? The lake is radiant with its steady presence. Everything that is green from spruce to pine is blended to form an intricate mosaic that pours into the day out of a marvelous vessel of being. He feels it then but has no words, for words are not needed. And its flow will not wait for his stasis to catch fire: its secret lies in not-thinking, breathing only, seeing only, touching.

Glimpsed from under the water, the sun’s penetration is breathtaking. It fractures itself into tiny echoes over the lake-floor in a shimmering landscape where fish of all types wander. Their lidless eyes look straight ahead, affixed only on the present they are swimming through.

The water leaks into his plastic goggles reminding him of his limitations. When he surfaces for another breath of air, he hears only the sound of his breathing and a tepid breeze pushing the water along in wavelets. The clean lake water has a sweet mineral-taste which he does not know will travel with him like a birthmark from that day forward. He gazes down into the clear depths known to him intimately from the neck down and takes another deep breath before descending again, shivering as he glides through a cold stream along the bottom.

Ah, for turtles,
the long afternoons
without clocks,
languid summer days
without names

The turtles have fled, but it doesn’t matter. The boy is Ulysses on an adventure. He is the offspring of a welder and a nurse who love him in their way. And that love has left its signature in the cool shadows of the pines on the island, in the freedom they gave him without reservation to be alone.

And the water? How does it feel to the body? How does one describe its sensation to another who may never have experienced swimming underwater in a lake?

For him it is like a "glove" of being for the flesh; it is all action, a glorious loss of self. He has no need to gaze at pictures he himself is inside. And he waits impatiently through the seemingly endless New England winters for this greatest of pleasures in each new summer, the touch of water.

The boy paddles to the island shore, removes his gear and dives from a smooth boulder that protrudes from a ledge. He might say years later that buoyancy, the equilibrium between two mediums, is our most perfect affair with fluid, and that gravity is beautifully distorted in its viscosity. The physicist may describe swimming through water as moving among laminar films or layers that deflect around the body. If this is so, the boy feels the constant rising and falling of its changing layers and edges as a hundred thousand fingers in direct contact with his skin, though this would still be far from precise.

The common painted turtles he seeks are only an apostrophe in the contraction, a means of connection. Gathered together again, they tumble down off the half-submerged tree and into the water as he waits anxiously below its surface to watch them flee. Scattering like dandelion seeds, he gives chase but they always remain, as if by design, just beyond arm’s reach. He pulls handfuls of water excitedly behind him, and then with a light thrust of his fins, glides with his arms outstretched like a forward rudder defining his plane of movement.

Stretching, reaching out
to touch a turtle’s smooth back, 
an awkward stranger
chasing
tremors of grace

Despite his frantic strokes and grabbing at distance, he cannot keep pace with the turtles. But his failure only gladdens his thumping heart, whose inner chambers now surge wildly with infinite possibility.

He boards the little boat again, shoves off and starts the engine. Without looking back, he throttles it up to top speed and encircles the island before heading home. That is why he is not a conqueror.

Just as all roads
once led to Rome’s great city,
all the paths of my life
lead at once to a lake and a summer
of twenty-one days

 

A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A TEA STUDENT IN KYOTO
Giselle Maya

Out of the futon by 7 a.m. Eight mean breakfast of miso soup, rice and pickles. Dressed in kimono and walk to the tea school. A throng of light and dark kimono enters the building for the morning lecture – about the casting of iron kettles. By noon, lunch in a hall with students from all over Japan and a sprinkling of international guests. A short walk along the streets of Northern Kyoto and a visit to a shrine.

Clapping hands twice
at Jizosama's shrine -
may our knees hold out
the teacher bows
adjusting a white lily

By 1:30 afternoon practice. Kobayashi-sensei enters in an elegant black kimono after all students are seated on their knees in seiza. We practice kagetsu, a particularly intricate ceremony where guests take a turn as host. None of us gets the footsteps right – a measured, precise walk where each step counts – no stepping on tatami borders. So we repeat all afternoon, sitting, rising walking, preparing and drinking macha. By 5 pm we leave, exhausted. I go to the public bath (o-furo), to soak in hot water into which someone has put a clump of roots to give us strength.

body and mind
into very hot water
the heart of a flower
hidden with the chafed skin
of an earth-colored bulb

 

 

touch and go 11/17
marlene mountain
 

craig i just spent an hour-and-half on phone with apple mostly on hold until i finally talked with tristan who called frankie while i was on hold who is suppose to call me to say that the first external modem didn't work and i'm to say again if i'll pay that percentage for another one so frankie can call dan and tell him but i said several times to tristan that dan said that greg said that i have a new cs number that's to fix everything on the mac free including the zip drive which tristan knows nothing about tho he's dan's boss and a cs manager and thinks he knows that greg so forty-five minutes later i'm still waiting for frankie to call but of course now the store has closed and it's friday. lovemm

in a pickle with a lemon from apple it's touch and go bananas

 

LAGGING LEFT
Sheila Murphy

Domestic birds offer commendable withholding of our recent fears. This is what I woke up thinking in the creased new sheets we nearly sent back based upon an overrun of subtlety in colors green to gray to ether wool. The latch was still ajar when I arose to fix the tilt of sun that streamed from mini-blinds. This day, my stretch goals, poisson ce soir avec a priest who would forgive as he forgives routinely everyone within his path. What won't surprise will still the threshold of suppressed own sentences that reach near heights. Dream cannot be told in prose, but that is plenty reason not to quantify a slow boat's aching into hemispheres unknown. Today I don't know who I want to be afraid of. Matriculation is an enviable process, or it was. For a self, mere tresses lank their way down shoulders. Maybe they would wither where I almost walk. Recessive genes are furious with grief. At least that's the impression I received when coffers opened widely. Wells are often full. That's the philosophy I start to preach when occupied by ventures. Think of thrush. The restive generosity comes close to having been consumed, when all the clothesline asks is to be plucked. The traffic signals pause. Within the scope of hearing, centrist integers go prime. Our magnified indulgence happens to be pawned as matrilineal indoctrination trades acceptance for chapped kiss rehearsal.

Exorbitant new kinds of wheels, hewn to level majesty, aside from norms, astride their quivers

 

MANTRA BREAKS ME
Sheila Murphy

Evenly, in two, philosophy splits open so I see both sides. Events have often predeceased their outcomes. Thus, the color velvet glows almost porch-side or a balcony apart from what really occurred. I venture guesses as I venture speech. The Rolodex is full of offers I decline. Then whiffle language offers selves to glee gods, goddesses. I rove in twin domains. I supplicate indentured lay free tokens of indebtedness. If ever there were squalls, I might accommodate the notion peace is just this side of Cuba. Stripes decode our indecision, possibly. Host prints seize viatical endorsements of who is likely to recede into a covenant. Nautical neglect means there are young, lean floating objects latent with imagined life. Watch Styrofoam be sensed so living motion won't subside. Each of the nights confides new information I did not know lingered. What is safe to say is also moderato in our legion premises. A covenant entails two sides. Our river rafting means we'll flow somewhere with current neither of us can deride. It's raining every afternoon bequeathed with tall humidity. Some stunning silence means a quark or two to be investigated or invested in. I say words slowly, as I cease to think.

Practice pause, delicate sea birds moving with and in supplanted wind

 

SHE WOULD LACK, LIFE WOULD SUFFICE
Sheila Murphy

Engendered third-party decisions test the mute cone in collective trumpet taste. I think I'm young enough now to be fed the glory that will not bleed into epidermal rants. The quest is like the coast is like the silver tray. Be dumbfounded in keeping with the sly new tact reported by a fiery young integrity. Watch each branch lean low to middling near the window cusp of wood distinct from usual adobe. If a prayer were strummed, it would sound thus: malinger, stow, refresh. If centered in fictive domains, one part of us might relish even snow. Hear boots crunch on hillsides, lumbering that presupposes squeaks and forwarding new style. Brass instruments remember us to parties heretofore unknown. That rhyme with our own speech. I tell her fever, and I tell her stories. I admonish what she's seeded back to bellwether delusion. Fall, swell, stipulate, refuel become our wandering agenda set. Excel is how we lark our way into neutrality blessed by the hoards of minions.

Lucid stall, the question about objects in our speed of thought, arrangements

 

WHEN I PLAY MUSIC I PLAY
Sheila Murphy

Slow, dark repartee, I pour out souls I have not had. I render mendicant advisories. I portion out the languor I would quantify to mint condition allegretto. I decide how passion might be lured to cloisters. Or I wryly wait for seams to fortify what lies between. She always integers my faithless snow. She waits. She rations what I know. There are details to fathom, and I launder faith as though it were a few long weeds to stow. The paucity of young detail is urgently revised by learned contentment. Then I sow a few yarned wheat lengths of the glow. The routines are stories near enough my theoretical receipt of the directed theory parsed from practice. I hear the falter work its way toward treasure, leave a wake of likely strength. Is this the parchment song was written on. Measured in the scent of hurt. A failed canary dangling fevered melody near what we know. 

Whole tones left to rise, the faculty of recollection

 

MAY I HAVE THIS DANCE?
Rod Thompson

I stopped on the side of the road, shut off the headlights, then the engine. The northern lights were shifting across the stars like a huge silk bandana blowing in a silent wind. I wanted to describe this wonder to you when I got home so got out of the truck to get the full view. Veils of green light swept across the sky so quickly and with such sudden turns and folds that I expected to hear the hiss of light rubbing the cosmos. Instead, a coyote yipped from a distant hill. Soon every dog, wild or chained, joined in like bull-riders hooting at a rodeo dance.

That's when I figured out how to explain them to you. When I first saw you at that dance in McKenzie Hall. The feeling in my stomach - put that in the sky and you have what every stargazer saw tonight.

night sky magic
men cry 'aurora borealis'
the coyotes laugh
to hide their fear of fire
dancing among the stars

 

PIGEON MOUNTAIN
Linda Ward 

As I cross the one-lane bridge a few cattle pause to glance up at me from the swiftly-flowing creek below, then amble up the bank to the monastery's pasture. A sharp curve leads me up from the creek bed, and I feel the weight of built-up tension fall in a rush as the familiar bell tower emerges between tree tops.

low glide of turkeys
down the slope of a field
gentle toll of bells

At the foot of the convent's walkway I stop for a moment and scan the rolling hill below me, searching for the huge old apple tree whose fruit I know will be gathered by nuns and deer in the fall. I find it toppled by a recent storm, its ridge of dark roots protruding from the earth. . .

shades of twilight
a pale crown of blossoms
whitening

Pressing the visitor's bell, I silently give thanks for the ancient traditions of this Cistercian Order, who provide solitude for those seeking refuge from the distractions and demands of the day-to-day world. Sister Claire, currently assigned retreatant duties, appears at the top half of the Dutch door where I wait, as instructed by a faded notice posted on the wall.

Rocksport-shod
sister in traditional
black and white
. . .age-old blessing
and embrace

An old farm gate locked behind me, I drive slowly up a gravel road that leads to the retreat cabin isolated on a rise overlooking a pond and the stone remains of an 18th-century ice house. My favorite handwritten sign is still in its place by the door. . .

hermitage rules:
when Sister cuts the grass
please refrain
from speaking
unnecessarily

And this is why I come: silence for five days without telephone, television or computer. Immediately I sit zazen, the spirit of this place caressing mine. . .

just after sunset-
the raucous signaling
of Canada geese

The rustic three-room cabin is equipped with a wood stove and has a small rotating library stocked by the sisters and retreatants. A crucifix hangs over my single bed, yet the reading material reflects a diversity of teachings on meditation and prayer from Sister Teresa to Krisnamurti. I find a small round of gouda in the refrigerator--the livelihood of these dozen or so nuns whose cheese barn adjoins their convent. A loaf of bread from a Trappist monastery is also provided.

hands joined in labor-
flavor of a simple meal
intensified

Darkness settles more suddenly in these mountains than it does along our coastal plain, and I eagerly crawl into bed, knowing from past visits how quickly my whole being slips into the cycle of meditation, study and simple chores this contemplative order follows, as though attuned to the biorhythms nature intended. The geese too have quieted for the night and sleep comes almost instantly. . .

echoes
of monastery bells
awaken me
in my cabin retreat
ghostly taps against the wall

When the bell for matins stops I listen for the odd noise I thought came from just outside. . .how soon silence has released my hidden fears! I raise the window shade to reassure myself that my solitude remains undisturbed. . .

3 a.m.
crossing the dew-covered lawn
glow of the full moon

Bracing my back against the rough log wall behind my bed I begin to focus on my breath, somehow reassured by the idea that the sisters too are meditating in their rooms.

in stillness of night
solitary moan of wind
rising and fallling

Walking meditation at dawn, my legs adjusting to the  steepness of the rocky mountain paths--such a change from the flatlands I'm accustomed to. . .

morning mist wavers
only the caw of the crow
crosses the pond

At the crest of the trail the faint trickle of a nearby creek and countersongs of birds cross the hills. . .

orchard oriole-
the whole body throb
of his song

My afternoon alternates with periods of writing, reading and meditation. I try mindfully washing dishes as advised by Thich Nhat Hanh. Later, I take the mile walk to the cloister, then follow signs to the visitors section of the small chapel where vespers will be sung. Concerned that I might arrive late and interrupt the service, I find I have instead arrived early. . .

smoldering wax
in the empty chapel
a kneeling pad creaks

Soon the sisters file silently in. . .then lost to my
view in their private corner of this sacred place. . .

not knowing
this weight had become
so heavy. . .
the nuns' chant at vespers
unstoppable tears

On my last morning I sweep the cabin, strip linens from the bed and bag up my small bit of trash. After dropping these off in the convent's parlor per instructions, I leave my car radio turned off, relishing a final period of silence. I'm grateful for a cool, cloudy day, allowing me to keep the car windows closed against the traffic.

four days of silence
in the old log cabin
-my mind
haunted yet
by those it released

 

PUR
John M. Bennett

sur mount nor light nor
count less sand les
drinking in the room foam
lice leached "singing was"
sleep above it's "all" nor
(ringing, doubtless; R

 

SPRAY SAY
John M. Bennett

Say lung, spray high, le
an away 'n at, it ch
an ear, dry yr nose
keep adding up. na da
r storm, it's all just . . .

stooping, plying. s horn
all ways are won yr
nap drips yr wake d
at reams creamly drys the
steps. beaking utter song

 

LAST AWAY
John M. Bennett

Fit to dry I nak ed
wob ble in the sulate the
air water, skin a
beach. or cliff. ac
curate, flapping fli pping
through the see the nee
d low. the floorish
bends the treat trou
ble insular yr hair
flooder (mud and belly

 

LANG
John M. Bennett

t ime humming
w edge im
mouf

(roof, uid

 

SWIM OF A NARRATIVE
Werner Reichhold 

Swim of a Narrative
the gurgle the r before the g

one drop’s tongue into the path
not passing the one so far ahead

drop the repetition loaned
to softness for a while.

My pillow of wolf-haired yellow
undated      at dawn     the fur

the earliest riddle.
Is there a plan compressed

mixed motion? From the breath of a fang
one feels a premonition is here

its blouse unbuttoned
as if a shift has meaning

in an age of corridors
sweeping the self’s slow long view

 

II

In a dense net of a player’s toy
lured in with a swarm of guests
the spider at a museum
in the frame work of a picture by Vermeer

above the unexpected baby
diagonally cutting the format
the girl holds her lover’s letter folded
Dutch light gives the season questions
a doorway of defense the doorstep viewing
a catalogue of planned journeys.

Off quicksand, footprints and argument periodically
one interior, one depreciation. Aladdin, his rusted lamp
needs sanding, needs a quick shine focused
on a silhouette’s internal face.

Equivalences before priorities. Such an effort to serve up  personified transgression, the cuckoo’s foreign egg colors the nest; an eulogy of neglect, hinted? Can one demand that such a collage becomes the invitation for a swim dominated by salty strategies? Is Sunday Saturday’s warm grave or simply a lower parallel, a unique view seemingly parted?

One may express it mathematically as the rule of three, but one can also figure it out emotionally as a warmer, as a more wet device: the dowser arrives smoothed, a still green switch preparing infrastructure, meanwhile thirst and the confused handling of wishes talk to each other. 

The liberation of literary tools wrecking resources. Bricks before they get fired red like a rose in a far away
lover’s dream.
What is a spoken word’s record, a will, foolishness
fluctuating with permission?

Scorpion            the entire neighborhood grows into
grows apart by this earth or orb sign of the Zodiac.

Trade wind. Shall I be going to send Diana new arrowheads? With a dart of her tongue she seizes the comrade-in-arms. One arrow points to a web site advertising pig-skin slips click       wrong page 
keeping land mines abysmally active.

The left breast tattooed, the ink chooses to follow a blue vein. A vowel mutates to the map of putrefactive river spawn just as two people finish in puce the laying side by side 
stung a bee’s lust fleeing hive-wards virgin honey

 

III

It doesn’t support choosing. A former event passes by, its form seems evenly distracted, followed by a tail of light.

The night comes with the charm of financial arrangements. 
I pay and you wear a petticoat for an alternating route.

Later we wish to place ourselves under an open skylight.  
Something not yet articulated holds up pressure.

Against glass it occurs clear, touchable only by leaning
forward against a larger eye, the telescope.

Seldom one feels so very close and separated
like on the last day of December. Suppertime

on our plate
a painted swan takes off
the white of porcelain

 

IV

The line an artist draws refers to a dialogue. A lifelong impatience is kept in a hand’s movement. Francis Bacon’s colors are shaped through dialogues, resting finally in painfully winding bodies of his friends. In fact, the pieces of dialogues are owned by us, the visitors. Masterpieces fall in love with each other and stay with collectors. Often, well balanced dialogues happen between objects before men interfere.

Today, only a handful of American Indians would try to exchange the softness of a daughter for a new bow. The hunter’s tendon is tuned in D major before the arrow makes contact with a deer. Then, a new dialogue occurs, the downer’s mind travels
contemplates 
oh think how fast how brown-skinned will be our tribe

 

V

A snake’s belly
up my ankle
say, Miss Tsí’gone
do those teeth bite
if I wish for again?

question marks ascend
red above the point
the sailboat’s lanterns
as they sink
to a near dive under the horizon

enrapture of intrusion
the private sphere a membrane
through the cellular
a man she had not seen
the sound of a beggar

insistent       indulgent
collaborative linking
the paper    the pencil
epidemiological rouge
depending on the eraser

we speculate in the kitchen
why those two faucets
for different reasons
drop simultaneously
but unequally strong

 

VI

she / he
(the empty space reserved
for the unknown
mind
moving in)

The size of this morning          the root of this hair

noon            circling in the face of its dreamer

two wishes for one lake  deep but not yet permanently

stone and ointment    the call at the present

located   dawn flattering    at a barn owl’s beak

Luck of a flutter-kick, the breath bereft of its length released from talking. The liquid consonant a fool’s choice, adjustable. A weep for marble-framed assemblages barely lit. Charmers’ reconciliation about masculine attitudes. The youngest pair of scissors, her quibbler lost. A tale-bearing talisman makes her street shadow ring

spare bedroom guest
the one jogging in Half Moon Bay
depending on
headphones

 

VII

Beribboned
slim fingers’ quest
on bottles
scent
beside his letter
as part of an astrological chart
she meets herself
night fades
carrying adamantine bits
inside a dark voice

nearby
a creek finds her
polishing leaves
in both eyes
the glimmer
occurring as if it is not there
before one believes in it

reading in reverse
up my spine the mother’s
frail connections
white appears
bone-folded


we’re occupied
by spasm
when a cardinal connects
(as the physician calls it)
heat waves

some sound sent
as we speak
does not arrive
over a migrating tongue
scrupulous inflamed
at which speed
aiming
ailing
she circumnavigates it
not unwillingly

curling the air attentive
a black cat’s tail
writes

doesn’t it?
forward backward flag

 

VIII

Distortion, dissuasiveness? Since men can enjoy the fits surfacing a sub why not women, too? Distress after fun? In a stainless-steel-age crime burst in like Lautréamont’s flooded stories. Energy, if so charming in disorder, what would it be arranged? 

words    on both sides of a door’s eye     unwilling ears

Possession of an ocean that deep? In case Pandora would be hanging around, let us say unemployed by mortals, she could be the Priestess in Command on board, her swaying altar black with the smoke of sacrifices close to nuclear devices. 
Morning glow. Bells. An E oracle from Delphi arrives:

Look, this screw’s threads can be thought without ends.A well oiled nut moves freely by magnetic powers. Neither spring is longer in the path of summer nor will autumn stop winter from circling by the law of pull and push on the gloss of an eggplant.

Breakfast. Pandora in the process combining her knowledge about koans with the message of a Greek sister’s oracle. She keeps sucking on an angled straw dipped in warmed spinach water. Longing for the conditioner, and after a delicate make up painting her eye brows as high as the waves roar above the ship, she lets herself into one more meditation. Guided prayers and the cobalt box can spend time to fuse until they become one at the target

incense? the smoke not to see through incontrovertible sleep.

Swim of a Narrative (eight chapters) contains ghazal, free verse, one-liners, combinations of 3-liners and 5-liners, prose, dialogue, stage-like scenes, riddle / koan, symbiotic techniques (link / leap / link), mythology, artistic and theoretical concepts, the very nature of social and political aspects.

 

SIJO

erotic dream imagery
finds desire awakened

poking a lit match into darkness-
the blue puff of the pilot

how her naked hip warms my palm
as freezing rain falls

gino peregrini 

 

glazed by the moon, the silver maple
holds one planet, bright and clear

hydrangea stalks cast shadows
over the cat squatting on snow

this thicket of ink conceals words
with the moon in their eyes

gino peregrini 

 

our tom-cat curls his shaven back,
his sutures painted yellow

as he sleeps, winter's first storm gathers
over fields on far plains

beside my leg, the cat lies calm,
his stubbled skin gleaming

gino peregrini 

 

the moon hides in Leo
while freezing rain speckles window-panes

gangster rappers string stank rhymes
into gold chains of sonic bondage

all the lions in the Ozarks
roar their anger when moons freeze

gino peregrini 

 

bright garnet weaves through cloudy streaks of apricot and amber
backed by twilight blue with touches of cobalt mauve and indigo
her favorite colours - I knit into this soft wool scarf

Kirsty Karkow

 

Strong neck arched, ears attentive
sleek flanks glisten in the sun.

The Arab side-steps, pirouettes,
quickly dodging the angry bull.

Horse and rider dance together
...'til the work of the blade is done.

Kirsty Karkow

 

was that a glint of crystal wings among those clover blossoms
do I hear skips of dancing feet on dandelion petals
laughter trills like silver bells...there are fairies in this field

Kirsty Karkow

 

My searching eye long measures take
of stubborn banks of white. 
The neighbor's boy prepares his bike
while I sow lemon lily dreams.
But now I shop for bedding plants
for summer came last night.

Elizabeth St Jacques



once echoes softly filled cold rooms
and spilled into wide halls 
from maiden hands flowed fantasies
while royalty sat mesmerized 
destiny all talents claim
yet ancient lyres weave dream-light still

Elizabeth St Jacques

 

 

TANKA

x-ray
black and white photo
of my toe
where's
the pain

David Bachelor

listen
mourning dove's call
in the blue morning sky
contrails
of those who left

David Bachelor

 

VISION QUEST
Edward Baranosky  

windward specter
clatters against a worn gate.
a broken shark's jaw,
macabre feeding frenzy,
articulates a brisk dance.

the memory is
you throwing glowing frisbees
no one catches.
my painted kite takes the wind,
tacking above spinnakers.

nascent plumes of haze
obscure the buoyant moon
autumn storm
whistling through the breakers –
flights of sandpipers.

when did we arrive?
keep talking, don't look back.
instinct is to turn.
for a moment there, it seemed
we were trapped in the past.

cliffs' prow beyond
Purgatory Gorge cuts through
emerald surf.
stark horizon exposes
the brackish layers of spindrift.

 

TIDELINES
Tony Beyer

among shoreline trees'
imitative shadows
the sand holds
signs of repose
and movement well

here tea was poured
and here
a wasp crushed
with the flat base
of a picnic cup

bird song
gongs
in the high branches
soundtrack
for colour and light

a kingfisher
turns bright side out
at speed
down the face
of the cliff

from the water's edge
I watch you
in hat and dark glasses
basking over the pages
of a trite magazine

waves lift
the lace skirt
of the shore
a little higher
each time

constant small
fallings of sand
will by evening
have erased
our presence here

~!~

pale wisp of white cloud
form blurred in the morning fog
burning away in
the encroaching heat of a
Los Angeles summer's day

Korie Beth Brown

 

!LOCAL HISTORY:
Guillermo Compte Cathcart

The Rock! And tango...
a table and others
in the Circle
My parents dance with my
expensive chopped paper

(Year 1955. Dances of Carnival in the Social Circle Longchamps. There are a tango orchestra and a rock band. The children and girls hurtle chopped paper. As the bags of chopped paper they were of high price, each boy could spend three or four bags in one night)

A gargoyle
she cries for stone being
at Christmas
in Boris' garden
Drago street of Longchamps

(Year 1954. Boris and their family arrive from Hungary escaping from the Russian. They have a gargoyle in their garden. My mother and their mother are made very friends and the two families celebrate the Christmas together. Tatiana, Boris' sister tells me that the Gargoyle this sad one for stone being)

Ghost city
that I inhabit day by day
they laugh the ancestors
when putting me with their grandsons
in an angle of two times

(I am 55 years of age old. When I walk for the streets from Longchamps memory to people that no longer this or to the buildings that have disappeared. I see the grandsons of my friends and me I know that I am between two an angle times)

Broken china
with Napoleon fighting:
the earth is drunk.
Scottish warriors,
Colony Monte Grande

(Year 1825. First Scottish Colony in the Argentina. "Colony Monte Grande". At the moment a team of archaeologists this digging in a very old house and they found china with illustrations of Napoleon's wars. Some of the Scotsmen that arrived in 1825 fought in those wars. In fact an uncle great-great-grandfather, the General Lieutenant George Cathcart fought in Waterloo)

Cloth sparrow
it flew in Longchamps
it is your helix
a great raised monument
by Louis with their chess

(Local History: A french pilot , Henri Breggi, with a cloth airplane, made in 1906 the first flight in America of the South, in Longchamps. In 1963, Luis was an employee of the Country Club Longchamps and it challenged the president of the club to play 10 chess departures. Luis won and like prize asked that the Club made a great helix to remember the flight of the sparrow of France)

The empty house
three horses, a pig
three sad meek thin dogs
the Brother George
the lamp and their cross

(Local History: Arrival of the Brother George Rüttershoff from Germany the 6 de August of 1917 to Calzada Village for built a church in a lonely moor)

~!~

while planting bulbs
my wife unearths
a childhood cap gun of mine
i hold it
trying to grasp back then

Thomas P. Clausen

 

she's died so early
not even fifty yet,
that golden summer ago
when some of us boys
saw daylight between her breasts

Thomas P. Clausen

 

where my life has come
to this feeling so much
gone by forever
in the rush of traffic
i am

Thomas P. Clausen

 

another day
i witness
the sky grading out
my life too, so caught
in circles

Thomas P. Clausen

 

I can't penetrate
any further
this life and death
up before our star
erases all the rest

Thomas P. Clausen

 

Thinking of you
Lonely in the afternoon
Summer heat beats down
A red-tailed hawk's piercing shriek
Splits the humid air

Maggi Sullivan Godman

 

A RED ARROW
Elizabeth Howard 

heat lightning
backlights the forest
a lurid patch of mushrooms -
the knobby mass
in the x-ray

on the pond bench
listening to a chorus of frogs
until a green heron lights
amid pink lilies -
the waiting silence

on the bluff edge
a lone woman
a silver thread
of river far below -
Don't! I want to shout

screech of rusty legs
cicadas tuning up
the elementary concert
an orchestra of strings
my teeth on edge

a rose-spotted lizard slips
from the fissure of light
in the scattered boulders -
a scarlet slash
across my chest

basking in evening sun
on the river bank
reeds rippling
a wren's anthem ringing -
I startle at the heron's voice

once a turbaned woman
in a car at the trailhead
too weak to go but yearning -
now my turn to sit
remembering

the sky as blue
as periwinkles on the hill
a cardinal singing
in the white cherry tree -
is this the glow of virtue?

casino lights-
after chemo I wager on health
red chips on faith
white on aesthetics
blue on laughter

coming toward me
through the snow
like a red-feathered arrow,
a cardinal -
joy in the morning

~!~

newly created
in a neglected field
a labyrinth
for passing pilgrims
to circle inward

Kirsty Karkow

 

trailing crows
a red-tailed hawk spirals
through the clouds
I ponder how to move beyond
black thoughts that torment me

Kirsty Karkow

 

reclusive neighbour
finally visits to say
his wife has died
surprising how I miss
someone I hardly knew

Kirsty Karkow

 

a roiling sky,
the traffic light blown
aslant -
if there's anything I don't need
it's another day at work

Larry Kimmel

 

in the midst
of the sunrise parking lot
a shoe -
perhaps I have lived apart
too long

Larry Kimmel

 

I wish I could show you -
how the daddy-long-legs pins
its shadow,
with a kind of elegance,
to the wall's pure white

Larry Kimmel

 

looking up
from the mini-manifesto
on her T-shirt,
I get this loathing look - "
hey!
I'm a slow reader. okay?"

Larry Kimmel

 

this chilly morning,
over oatmeal, my wife tells me
she's only sorry she can't
remember them -
last night's erotic dreams

Larry Kimmel

 

the frosted window
and the curls of ice beneath
my fingernails -
how to put away childish things
while remaining child-like

Larry Kimmel

 

just as I snap
a banana from the bunch
the hawk sweeps by
grasping, at the very least,
a talonful of leaves

Joann Klontz

 

the sign reads
no parking from here to bridge
so civilly
we birders and anglers
practice disobedience

Joann Klontz

 

in town for a wedding -
the trolley car sparks
memories of a spinster aunt
and summer sunday rides
to the end of the line

Joann Klontz

 

DEMENTIA SERIES
(excerpts)
Thelma Mariano 

she always told us
to eat our vegetables
now she has
ice cream for breakfast
cheesies at night

she says
her drinking water now comes
in brown bottles
I see in her pantry
a half-dozen beers

her own version
of international time -
she confuses
five o'clock in the morning
with seven at night

it eludes her
even as she struggles
to get it right
a small mechanical thing
beside her unopened cans

how badly
she wants to convince
her social worker -
the neatness of a home
that was always cluttered

hours of
dealing with her problems -
on my way home
I feel the tenseness
leave my shoulders

caught
between deadlines at work and
her increasing needs
I forget it's pay day:
my own time slipping away

 

RED LOTUS
Autumn Palumbo

Red lotus blossoms
On crimson waters at dusk.
Blood from my lover's
Tragic bullet wound darkens
Like the night waters.

 

THE BALLAD
Carol Purington
 

The ballad
of a long-ago princess...
the children's eyes wide
with the splendor of that world
my mother wove for me

White with snow
and blank of memories
a new year
in this new landscape
my tongue now names as home

First left by my parents
in a hospital room
in isolation
the dark of their going
the dark of my staying

Only snowflakes
and the shadows of black-and-white birds
in this frozen world
Pink daffodils will bloom
and I will be happy

A pond that beaver made
fished now in the magic of twilight
by a tall heron
it is time to go indoors
but I'm not living in time

The white bear that walks
the borders of my world
in narrowing circles
one rosy dawn I will see death's tracks
pool with pink light

A strand of hair
blown against my cheek by a breeze
that lingered long
among Persian lilacs
gathering peace

Blurred the colors
swirl emerald to crimson
ruby-throat's summer
to pause with steady heart
before each day's unique bouquet

 

TANKA:
R K Singh

She receives my call
complaining why I don't go
to see my father
while he says it's alright
only gums bleed and joints ache

Bored with politics
and news of falling sensex
he folds the paper
and flips through the old PLAYBOYs
to see the nudes seen in youth

~!~

 

in the forest
as water follows the river
our love awakened -
your hand gently touched my face
in a fragrant sky of stars

Maria Steyn 

 

his smiling eyes -
the calm brightness of sunlight
on windblown pansies
so patiently gentles
this dream-borne soul of mine

Maria Steyn 

 

birch trees . . .
in the growth rings
of our arms
love slowly deepens
into summer seasons

Maria Steyn 



between snow spots 
a butterfly brown and white 
on pine needles --
to know brightness and calm
in this cold world 

Elizabeth St Jacques


in sunset glow
around the smooth boulder
white water swirl
the way her slow fingers
twist a long blond lock

Elizabeth St Jacques


twilight lake
of my childhood
glittering memories
my father's eyes
as he baits the hook

Elizabeth St Jacques

 

an eagle's shadow
crosses the Little Big Horn
in my dream
tourists buy indian bread
along a narrow road

Marc Thompson

 

when dawn breaks
the earth turns into colors
and animals
that only see in black and white
are graced with shades of gray

Marc Thompson

 

in the early chill
of a mid-November day
a bald-headed man
hides inside his jacket
and smokes a cigarette

Marc Thompson

 

the school crossing guard
walks slowly from his corner
three thirty PM
he complains to his hotplate
at the close of his day

Marc Thompson

 

the card players
take their usual places
Thursday afternoon
the smell of the food court
and orthopedic shoes

Marc Thompson

 

a tinny guitar
echoes through the bookstore
Saturday night
another cup of coffee
and another cinnamon twist

Marc Thompson

 

the caretaker
at the cemetery
died at his desk
behind the line of trees
a line of trees

Marc Thompson

 

painting mountain faces
by this rock-flour stream:
palette of blues -
my cold hands real content
is in your amber eyes

Rod Thompson

 

before sunrise
tensed for the coming day
i reach out
your hip - such strength
in the curve of a cradle

Rod Thompson

 

want an egg?
yes but hurry i'm late
you poach 3
2 for me glistening on toast
our morning for 30 years

Rod Thompson

 

crowded passengers
intent on journey's end
glass-eye silence
only the child holds her tummy
when the elevator lifts

Rod Thompson

 

crows joy-ride
past my desk on updrafts
children laugh
lighting up 30 floors
of elevator buttons

Rod Thompson

 

I hold a paddle
where glide used to follow kick.
Strokes or hissing skis
the cadence leads me through
a fine dance with the seasons.

Rod Thompson 

 

A damp morning
with rain dripping
from the eaves -
every vein in my body
bears the pulse of spring.

Jane E. Wilson

 

How far we have walked
along this dusty road,
thinking only
of blazing forests
and smoldering mountains ...

Jane E. Wilson

 

After midnight, I stand
beneath a late summer sky
and wonder
if you are watching these same
fast moving clouds.

Jane E. Wilson

 

   
   
  Submission Procedures 

Who We Are

Deadline for next issue is 
September 1, 2001.

  Poems Copyright © by Designated Authors 2001.
Page Copyright ©Jane Reichhold 2001.

Table of Contents for this issue.

Find out more about Renga, Sijo, Tanka, Ghazal.
Check out the previous issues of 
LYNX XV-2 June, 2000
LYNX XV-3 October, 2000
LYNX XVI:2 February, 2001

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