Jewels in the Sky

Glistening jewels coat
the tips of trees
which light the skies
with lofty ease.
Priceless Rubies, Topaz stones,
and Mandarin Garnets
in orange tones.

Each will be sold in silent bidding
with votes harnessed
from a passing crowd
of wide, uplifted eyes
whose currency, only fitting,
is to be pleased-
sometimes out loud!

Later these gems
whose fiery flames
burned without heat
and singed none but their stems,
these dazzling comets
will fade and fall
down to earthly feet
whose toes will curl
deep into the ground
and stoke the coals
for next years round.

A Mardarin Garnet.

Poem for Tim

I love you
more than I can stand,
less than I need.
Where is the bed,
the sweet sheets
to hide our shame
and our ineptitude?
Are the stars enough,
the milky blanket
which shields us nightly?

I am numb, paralyzed
until you touch me.
Kiss me,
Unleash the flood.
let me pour
over you,
through you
into you.

Inspire Beauty

I’m off to visit Platinum Glamor (my mother) out east. See you in the New Year! Garnet

I love the word inspire, whish literally means to breathe in. May you breathe in beauty, love, peace and joy.

May the light in your heart burn clear and long.

Thank you for the rich tapestry of your comments this first nine months. I look forward to longer days, more yang energy. May the heat in your heart warm you in the cold times.

Garnet

Beauty calls and yearns for your attention,
it gives rise and demension to your soul,
a reflection of your truest goals.

Lest we forget, our hearts are fueled
by a love enduring beyond our lives.
And beauty is its chaperone,
a spark through the dark nights
on the long walk
to the light of the mountain top.

All we have is each other.

May the comfort of love be with you.

Jingle Ironies

A day can seem like forever born,
a year but a passing shadow.
Ten hours in a car to nowhere, forlorn,
stellar travel just out on the patio!

There’s a feast before us, ready to consume,
yet the largest, glitziest package may be hollow
while the tiny, cardboard box may perfume
long winter nights with dreams one can follow.

A world in a word, sealed with a kiss,
yet years mayn’t ever heal a kiss wounded.
Who’s to say what the meaning is, ’til
you see that “you’ve got to choose it!”

Jingle ironies or love’s frivolity, it’s
not with whom, but how we share life, clearly.
Be gentle by your spirit and kindle its fortitude.
Share with those who might need it so, dearly.

technorati tags- Christmas poems, friendship poems

Ode to a Quilt

I’ve collected quilts for about 5 years. My dear friend Joe is my dealer. Sometimes I playfully refer to him as my drug dealer, because quilts are so addictive.

All the quilts I own are antiques, dating from 1830’s to the 1950’s. Most of them date from the end of the 19th century. Think about it; Unique folk art over a hundred years old with amazing artistic design hangs all over my house. To boot, they were made by women who lived during times when women got little credit for anything but baby making and housework.

The utilitarian nature of quilts adds to their richness. They are made to be used. Their makers didn’t need to trouble themselves with design. But they did. So the artistic inspiration embodied in these quilts is pure. These are noncommercial works of folk art. Their beauty was purely for the pleasure of the maker. Although pleasure is not the best word to describe this labor.

I am quite sure these women did not have time to spare for pleasure. Life in the late 1800’s was not luxurious for most people. I can image a women with a house full of children, working long hours cooking, cleaning, making clothes, washing clothes by hand, tending to a kitchen garden, perhaps tending to farm animals, and many other tasks, before having some time to hand stitch parts of a quilt.

Yet they did it. Each quilt contains that history, that labor, and those women’s hard-won “flights of fancy” in its cloth. The result is more than folkart. An unmistakable spiritual quality resonates in many of them.

Ode to a Quilt

Textile Bach-
stitched counterpoint
structured freedom.
Alert before you
rising up to your call,
yet yielding supplely
with a ripple.

Nexus of particulars:
a culture
a function
a person
(art)
A “herstory”
carved out of scraps, recycled
moments sewn together
with devotion and care
by chapped, aching hands
under dull candle’s sight.

Subtle joyous rapture
corralled by tradition.
As much a mirror
(reflection of a world within)
as a style of one.
(you with no sin)
Gravitas of conviction.
Smoldering
Jiggling
Vibrating
Swirling with
primal weight, hypnotic concision.
She recedes silently
with days fading light
then, later
twinkles nocturnally
with comfort and warmth.
Calling.
Aware.
See her yarn?
Familiar, now new.
Radiating
Strength
Stability
(softness)
Depth.

such rich modesty
such crystalline grace
a percolating prism of possibility.

technorati tags- quilts, American quilts, antique quilts, American folkart