THIS WOMAN'S LIFE

Photo/painting by S. Auberle

THIS WOMAN'S LIFE

(a cento)

How did we get to be old ladies--my grandmother's job--

when we were the long-legged girls?

~  Hilma Wolitzer

It's a pickle, this life.

All day the stars watch from long ago.

The brightness of the day

becomes the brightness of night

and I do not regret the passage of time.

Sometimes a moment is a monument--

an old moon, lying akilter

among a few pale stars,

twenty six willows on the banks of a stream

to which the small hum of bees wing.

Everything about you, my life

is both make believe and real,

but the future has arrived

and it is not unbearable.

I almost glimpse what I was born to.

The earth, with others on it, turns in its course.

~  mimi

for those of you unfamiliar with a cento--the word comes from the Latin for "patchwork" and it simply means a poetic form which consists of taking one line from a selection of poems and combining them in a new way.  Only one line per poet is allowed...it is a recognized form, first used by Homer and Virgil, so it's good enough for me!

THE MOUNTAIN

Photo/painting by S. Auberle

"Growing older

is like climbing a mountain:

the higher you get,

the more strength you need,

but the farther you see."

~  Ingmar Bermgman

ASHES TO ASHES

Collage by S. Auberle
(an old poem resurrected)

ASH WEDNESDAY  

Church of the Holy Angels

I’m six years old

kneeling before an altar

fingers rubbing my forehead

fear chilling down my back.

The priest whispers above me:

ashes to ashes, dust to dust…

 Ash Wednesday

Church of Red Earth

I’m sixty-something

kneeling in a crater

where lava once poured down.

I rub dirt on my forehead

find a potsherd

and remember

those buried beneath me

their sins and bones
only red dust on my jeans.

~  mimi 

A TURNING NIGHT OF STARS

Digitally altered photo by S. Auberle

This moment

this love

comes to rest in me.

Many beings

in one being.

In one wheat-grain

a thousand

sheaf stacks.

Inside

the needle's eye,

a turning night of stars.

~  Rumi

THAT KIND OF DAY

Photo/Painting by S. Auberle

a cardinal just flew away

as if he couldn't bear

all that gray

it's that kind of day...

~  mimi

FOR YOU, A VALENTINE

Artist Trading Card by S. Auberle

THE ONLY DANCE

(a cento)

There is a poignancy

in all things clear,

and the eye gets used

to disappearances,

but all gets watered,

sooner or later, with tears.

Still, this is written

on the back of everything--

the only dance is love...

~  mimi

    

POETRY OF ORANGES

Photo by S. Auberle

Italy, Cinque Terre region...a little inn at the top of the cliff...where I discovered these luscious fruits for the first time.  The room was dark, a bit musty, and the bathroom postage stamp sized, but o, the balcony--as big as the room, pots of flowers around the walls, the blue Mediterranean below, and on a crooked table, a bowl of blood oranges.  And now, in the heart of an icy Wisconsin winter, a bowl of sunshine on my table...

HAIKU MOON

Photo by S. Auberle

a ballet of swans

across the spring moon

night's curtain falls...

~ mimi

ZEN CROW

Artist Trading Card by S. Auberle

the branch is black and bare again:  a crow

shook down its coverlet of powdered snow!

~  Ho-o

I was recently introduced to the lovely art of artist's trading cards--miniature works of art that may never be sold, only given away or traded.  This is one of my first attempts (using a rubber crow stamp) but I am enchanted by the idea...if anyone out there wishes to trade cards, let me know...