Tag: Poetry

WORKS, WORTH

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

not by intent, exactly, when repairing rotten sill
and ripping away needless wires
strung overhead, but under the floor

at times, a two-man job, with banter

still, keep an eye open for the unanticipated byproduct
in this case, a jest
envisioning a beer and wine cellar under the kitchen

nothing fancy, but acknowledging
the homebrew art
and gratitude for a place to age bottles decently
as for the wine, a house rule price limit
imposed by a glutted market

in season, the bulkhead would open its wings
on the shaded grilling garden, to the north,
or its cavern of contemplation within

a place of solitude and spiders
Squirrel would frequent

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see the full set of Home Maintenance poems, click here.

 

PRELUDE & FUGUE 38/

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

 

in a salt marsh
in a lush gorge
against a glacier

*   *   *

at sunrise twelve horses
set out far below
a totem pole at sunrise in a salt marsh

horses set out below a totem pole
of twelve waterfowl trumpeting

at sunrise, yes, twelve horses
set out far below waterfowl
in a salt marsh

graze for yourself in a lush gorge
the agenda opens rhododendron
or a bald eagle on ash-covered slope

growling, yes, rhododendron openly graze
in a lush gorge under the bald eagle
the agenda of fish covering a slope

there, the rhododendron blooms
growl in the lush night, in its  gorge
the agenda you graze, hovering

no bald eagle on ash-covered slope
growls its agenda on ash-covered
rhododendron grazing into night

~*~

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see all 50 Preludes & Fugues, click here.

AT HEART

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

waging peace
restores harmony
uncovers common values where only conflicts
and differences in appearance surface
steps outside dominant viewpoints
teaches children alternatives to consumerism
which is self-centered at its core
engenders instead the practice of doing good work
reveals to us the unfavorable implications “God bless America”
extends to the rest of the world

O Holy One, waging peace reaches
to alienated people
envisions a holistic economy
embraces scholarship and meaningful labor
recasts globalization
to profit people in general rather multinational corporations
and powerful elites
fosters democracy and equality
rather poverty and powerlessness

*   *   *

Christ’s profound message of peace and justice
is seldom presented fully, much less heard or understood

each person needs to be respected and loved first
as a child of God, at heart

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see the full set, click here.

WHILE COOL, RAINY WEATHER DELAYS THE TOMATOES RIPENING

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

slugs thrive, and I’m back in Seattle, except
that here, broccoli, cucumbers, zucchini, and peppers
arrive in waves

and our woodworker-electrician and I tackle the barn renovation
in earnest

still, in a few breaks, I cross the line into Maine
sometimes with my Lady of Children’s Television
leaping rapturously in big surf
and sometimes with the afternoon all to myself
and once with the whole family
only to discover I’ve packed No 4 sunscreen
rather than No 15
(as a serious burns will demonstrate)

in all of this matter of burrows and burrowing
in the earth, in the foliage, at the beach

while fully resolving to keep the wedding simple
my Lady of Parsley and Sage delves deep into planning
what has already become too complicated for my taste
(“what do you mean, you don’t want a potluck?”)
and we meet with an Oversight Committee

in Portsmouth Harbor the family tours a Viking ship
on its way from Iceland to Manhattan
and the following week, a full-size Theodore Tugboat
with rolling eyes and all, as any kid watching PBS could explain

all the while, life itself feels submerged in Limbo
as absconded as our plumbers

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
For more, click here.

 

FADEOUT

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

a woman in an improbable hoop skirt
and headscarf
lights a wall of candles

salmon-colored bands on a wall, plus a solar diagram
and an Elizabethan woman

black chair, as two birds flying in opposite directions
as she reads her book

in a balloon, the fog

handbag and coffee New York

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see the full set of Partitas, click here.

NIGHT WATCH

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

1

between sunset and sunrise
the ocean returns to desolate obsidian

of her dark depths
in the character

at best, stars above
strand of shoreline, depending

maybe the moon
with her sea-legs

or repeated slapping

2

breakers arrive as a single point of reflected white
opening out evenly in a line on either side

a lip, sometimes to one side only
rarely claiming, “I love you”

sheets of gleaming water shift on the sand
or everything way out, obscured
in fog

scolding
pipers scurry about
on their stilt-legs

at highest tide, pebbles sound of boiling

with all the sunburned drunks long asleep
or the party, behind glass or on the deck
a cigarette meanders somewhere to my left
though I catch no shards of conversation

3

if only the beach were not broken
by rocky fingers and cliffs

unseen ledges and outcroppings

or overwhelmed in abrupt tempests

the night voyageur might sail dependably
by the compass

but vessels and their crews
mostly go down along coastline
blindly

mistranslating, the whole sense stymied
by a single word, a puzzle, upturned wind

4

count the seconds, then, in the flashing
points
matched to the chart

one red-lighted buoy
white caps below

Whaleback just clearing the hilltop

a large, well-lighted ship near the Shoals
waiting for high tide to enter Portsmouth

or on a very clear night, way off
Thacher Island, Cape Ann, Gloucester

how is it the Boon flare jumps about
three spots, playing the length of shrouded rock island?

of the available beacons
the closest, curiously, appears only a muffle

in the call of the underside
“come to me”

mournful bell or horn
and strobe light

restless, relentless
rhythm, however unpredictable
retreats, advances
restores, destroys
cleanses

5

I cannot imagine rowing ten miles to an island
at midnight

after an evening in town

but they did
for a drink or conversation
so they said

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see the full set of seacoast poems, click here.

WITH FINGERS AS THICK AS HOT DOGS

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Resting on the park bench, she complained
she couldn’t keep pace with her children.

When the seven-year-old pest returned,
demanding, “Ma, give me money”

for a cola, she complied,
thinking it love.

~*~

She couldn’t touch her toes.

~*~

Her legs pushed away from each other, yet

in her cotton dress, unexpectedly
as she swatted a fly, she began to float

and meticulously shrank from sight,
bouncing along the horizon.

To continue, click here.
Copyright 2015

 

PRELUDE & FUGUE 41/

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

in the dune of the black-eyed Susan
a schedule diametrically opposed to my own

*   *   *

a stargazer adjusts a pile of broken
shell and black-eyed Susan polished by sea-spray

in the dune behind an urchin
adjusting broken shell, the black-eyed Susan

polished by mist, the blanched dune
kelp adjusting a pile of broken shell

and black-eyed Susan polished
by surf sweeping along the dune

an astronomer adjusts a schedule diametrically opposed
to purple shoreline in the type case of shells and dull-edged
glass where my own pile of green stones in the box of shells
pile up a schedule diametrically opposed to dull-edged glass
the purple astronomer adjusts the typeface in case
shoreline shells pile his green-stone telescope somehow
diametrically opposed to any heavenly schedule he attempts
tuning the dull-edged glass of  my own type case of shells
piles in a schedule diametrically opposed to dull-edged
green stones along shoreline where I’ve set my own telescope

~*~

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see all 50 Preludes & Fugues, click here.

THE SURFACE

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

with distances
our skin
our heart
our thoughts

the countryside
a big city

such poverty and misfortune
such glittering opulence

visibly and invisibly
blinding

even before the mildew

*   *   *

my turtle shell my weakness
three times I’ve prayed it not be moved

*   *   *

casting addiction
or promiscuity
or crime
along racial
or ethnic
or neighborhood
in or out of

where charity is not supple
communion

no hour
attended as fully as we might

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see the full set, click here.