L. Edgar Otto 27 September, 2013
You see we do not know when is our last supper
We can make a calendar for the era, aim our stones and
pyramids to the season's clock of skies.
As if there is a past, our ancestors around us but
Receding into the distant dreams now miniature yet
the Virgin mothers all stars and moon beneath her feet.
Dry and hot the dusty desert yet night cold the need for fire.
Inspired eking out a living, time painted in still-life waiting for
better dreams to come, that this dry flower feast be not stillborn again.
.
The clay pots and teeth decaying corn, the woolly rugs
Woven with the colors of the clan and gleaned silver turquoise
mirror glances, windows to within.
Hearts spiny needled against the drought like starlight on a
Moonless night guides us to the once wide ocean time
That even ghosts gully dry cherish, drink the morning dew.
Returns again cattle rustlers dangling from the cottonwood
Trees, vigilantes and lawless poverty, a feast in a bowl of fruit,
the sprouting cactus flowers amid the smoke of sage.
* * * *
Footnote: see the photo New Mexico Dining Room (1940)
September 27, 2013
Imaginary Garden with Real Toads
Sometimes a horny toad's eyes squirt blood...
(Inspired eking out a living, time painted as a still-life
that this dry flower feast be not stillborn again) Marian's revision approved.
I was thinking of the fruit in the bowl in the pictures and that art student exercise as well, trying to capture motion in a snapshot or slice
forsooth, you give good advice In the flurry of writing this I did check some of the editing and spelling but did not think about the accidental coherence of the underlying themes at all... life is a long prison sometimes and to escape the mundane we are given a runaway sentence...
A beautiful write which so captures the wonders of the desert. I especially love the closing line.
ReplyDeleteoh, this line seems the heart of it, for me:
ReplyDelete"Inspired in eking out a living in Time's still life for better things to come
that this dry flower feast not stillborn again."
i wonder, you could maybe even remove "for better things to come" and it would have the same impact, more sharply, i think. maybe add "be" as well, like this:
"Inspired in eking out a living in Time's still life
that this dry flower feast be not stillborn again."
? just a suggestion. inspired, if you will. :) very nice poem.
I can hear those spurs clicking on the floor and quieting upon the colorful rugs, cattle rustlers dangling in the window view (love that image) from the cottonwood tree and the feast of fruit... yes, very nice.
ReplyDeleteMade me immediately want to go find the photo of this room. Lots of vivid imagery here.
ReplyDeleteYour mention of the desert night brought back memories of the Baja desert in Old Mexico, where my parents spent 30 winters. My friends would say "Ooh, a desert, so hot" and I'd say "Not at night, I need winter pyjamas."
ReplyDeleteBrought back lots of other good memories, too. "Sprouting cactus flowers amid the smoke of sage"...many people made fences by cutting ocotillo and sticking it into the ground, only to have it bloom when the rains came.
I was drawn to the miniature New Mexican room, too, but I'm still on a campaign to visit New Mexico and haven't talked my husband into it yet.
K
There's a perfect ambiance here--I also loved that room, as I love New Mexico, and I can see all the dry and prickly history you've drawn from it very clearly.
ReplyDelete