That Pomegranate Shine

Two brides arise from the river, shivering and shining like pomegranate seeds.
– Words from an Armenian Song


I was the wrong kind of bride,
more sweat than glisten,
more peach than pomegranate.
At twenty-three, in love with marriage,
not the man,
I plunged into rough water,
bringing grandmother’s candlesticks,
mother’s books and two silver trays.
Ten years later, I emerged shivering,
dragging my ragged volumes,
one candlestick and two babies.
On the bank, I shook off the water
and breathed.
Standing with my children,
looking out over the river,
the new brides asked me where
I got that pomegranate shine.

~ ~  Lori Desrosiers

Featured at   SplitThisRock.com as Poem of the Week,  June, 2010.  With permission of the poet.

Between Times

These times between times,
Transitions of one to another
Unlike winter or spring
Or Thursday
Which have standing and gravity;
Heft in the mind and extravagance on the tongue
Not that you’d know it
With all our blasé blasé and inattention
But they do and are
A destination of sorts
A roadside attraction
Rather than the passage itself
But these times between times are different
With no heart or skin
No nervous center or command bunker
Setting the rules of what’s what
No there as Ms. Stein might quip
Just a sitting on the bench
Waiting
Another image arises
Of a Wheel of Chance

Clacking like a Zydeco washboard
And skipping from one prize to the next
Thing is, I’m talking about the space between prizes
The time between times.

~ ~ Joshua Rose

Every Sound in the Cosmos

Every sound in the cosmos got trapped one day, in a
giant glass cube of silence
on a hill of new ferns

as soon as the sound was inside
it started to glow and lit up the whole sky

every bird-chirp harp-pluck bell-ring door-slam
pipe-stem-clench toboggan-swoosh airplane-drone
two-at-a-table outdoor terrace gossip tennis-serve lob-pop
ocean-roar surf-hiss gull-cry sky-boom
even the almost soundless expanse-sound of the sky itself
and the usually inaudible rumble of the earth as it creakily turns
and the faint sighing sound of the moon longing for its
origin somewhere in the Atlantic
and every heartbeat rat-a-tat of every
person on earth walking or sitting or sound asleep
each egg in its quiet hum
each sperm in its anxious and excitable wriggling high-pitched whistle

and silent clouds passed overhead
and silent light bathed the cube in supernal splendor

and for a moment people saw things as they really were
with a vision so complete

you could hear a pin drop

 ~ ~ Daniel Abdal-Hayy Moore

From: The Music Space (The Ecstatic Exchange, 2007). 

Fool

It is a privilege to be the fool
Of no consequence and silliness squandered
Of no rank
To see the world as it is
With an innocent eye
Defeating the horror with a tune
Turning a tune with a picture
No
You cannot fool the fool
With twisty ties of word
Or sleight of hand
Or trickster throwing down the cards
“Watch the queen, watch the queen”
Trickster nonchalants
Stealing your confidence
And twenty bucks
But not if you’re the fool
No sir!
Not if you’re the fool

~ ~ Joshua Rose