walked beneath the half-moon night
half in shadow, half in light
Orion raised his spear at me
suspended in eternity
trampled on a daffodil
in the dark side, in the chill
bent to touch the fragments tossed
feeling for the life I’d lost
here was simple tenderness
gone
one step, unseen, amiss
-
© 2010 by troy howell
empty pencil sharpener
scrape palette
stretch canvas
adjust skylight-
unlock trunk
catch dreams—
feed dragon
(I’m not. But they are fun.)
is the gasp
or the yawn
or the sneeze
or the song
or the symphony
of the self
or the shards
—
is the soar of the wings or the flit
or the flailing
—
is a stone that sleeps
in the somewhere soil
a star that winks
in the sometime sea
a sun that shines
from a somehow stalk
a cloud that shifts
in the somewhy sky
—
is the line
or collection of lines
or confusion of lines
or clarity of lines
of thought
—
is a dream outside a dream within a dream
-
written in an attempt to capture the uncapturable / by troy howell
-
AND THE END OF ALL OUR EXPLORING
WILL BE TO ARRIVE WHERE WE STARTED
AND KNOW THE PLACE FOR THE FIRST TIME.
from T. S. Eliot’s Four Quartets: “Little Gidding”
-
collage © 2002 by Olin Howell
Too cold the air, the earth, the walk, the glass the ledge the stonework the cat on the stoop.
The starry sky.
The sparrow’s breath.
The homeless figure in the cardboard box. The man on the subway bench.
C-old. The word says it, onomatopoeically.
Cold feet.
Cold fish.
Cold sweat.
Cold sore.
Cold virus. Common cold.
Cold pack.
Cold cream.
Cold soup.
Cold bath.
Cold storage.
Cold fact.
Cold shoulder. Cold glance.
Cold-hearted. Cold heart.
Cold turkey.
Cold blue steel.
Cold fire.
Out cold.
Out in the cold.
Left out in the cold.
Come in from the cold.
The Spy Who Came In From The Cold.
Cold War.
Cold-blooded.
In Cold Blood.
“The love of many shall wax cold.”
Baby, It’s Cold Outside.
Too cold is this
To warm with Sun—
Too stiff to bended be,
To joint this Agate were a work—
Outstaring Masonry—
How went the Agile Kernel out
Contusion of the Husk
Nor Rip, nor wrinkle indicate
But just an Asterisk.
Emily Dickinson
Closed Window
-
This small, faint
———————–—on the glass,
soft, fine,
——–—calm as a cloud:
the wing,
———–the breast of a bird:
the soul—
———ex
———–pecting
-
-
——-the blue
———-sky of
——freedom
———–beyond.
-
-
We tape fall leaves or paper snowflakes on the windows, but still it happens. A titmouse, a wren, a downy woodpecker. Sometimes they survive; sometimes I hear the quiet, collapsing blow and go out to see a bird lying beneath the windows, stunned. Or dead. Last summer it was a hairy woodpecker—black and white with a red head patch (a male). I picked him up and cupped him in my hands until he began to stir. His dark eye blinked at me several times, but it was another few minutes before he would perch without aid on the birdbath rim, and another few minutes before he flew away. He lived. I have seen him since, cheerily clinging to the bird feeder. This morning I found a feathered print on the glass—no bird in sight.
I rarely write poetry, and I’m sure it shows. But sadness and tragedy, disappointment and loss, seem to cry for memorials, however feeble our attempts.