Must Read Poetry in 2020

I have one book on my must-read 2020 Poetry list and this is it:  “”at Home with Disquiet” by friend & fellow blogger, Erin Wilson.  I’ve waited many, many moons to see this book.  Congratulations, Erin!  I am so very happy for you!  Erin is a magician with words:

The Diet Pill Scriptures by Jennifer Thal

My kitchen window Gods

Les Grandes Baigneuses, or The Large Bathers, is a painting by Pierre-Auguste Renoir made between 1884 and 1887. 

^_^_^_^_^_^

The Diet Pill Scriptures 

by Jennifer Thal

I turned to scripture in desperation

because they said we don’t have your size

in the store but we can order it online,

a secret package with contraband goods,

and I tried to crawl back into the dated canvas

of Impressionist paintings locked in stone

buildings, seeking comfort in the oiled

arms of women bathing in streams and

sunning themselves in open fields, but

found the frames broken and the figures

fled, and all that remained was a bottle

of text, inscribed with the declaration

that my body is a sin, a spawn of history

faded by varnish, that it should be reduced

pound by pound in the name of mercy

because Eve did not wear a size 16,

and that Eden does not have room

for plus-size women who are greedy

to take up space in an infinite garden.

I turned to the fatty foundations of my ancient

temple and burned it down, and began to build

a new haven made of diet pills, caffeine

headaches, and detox powders,

I opened my arms to the brethren of the BMI

and the sacred priests of the scale that stormed

the soft doors and proclaimed that there are

demons with sugar-spun claws that are holding

my smaller soul hostage, that I must banish

these creatures, burn the disciples who clutch

onto the false God of fat and stone them,

cleanse my altar and extinguish the radical

fires ignited by false prophets of self-love.

They wailed that my body is not holy

until I purge these evils from my flesh.

When I held the diet pills aloft

and kneeled, my knees were cushioned

by starved salvation and by porcelain

protection, and I heard a hallelujah

in the chorus of weight loss challenges,

and I carved from the sacred text the letters

XS into my skin.

I vowed that I would become a devout

practitioner of counting calories and pray

to the icon of a beach body, that I will

believe in a higher power of green-tea

supplements that will exorcize the hedonists

hiding in my pockets of fat, that even when

the deities of diet pills remained silent

and would not grant me the salvation

I was promised, I would behead

the betrayers, one by one until

there was nothing left but bodies

rotting in the Entrance, and the sharp

pang of glory in my empty temple.

House, Garden, Madness by Cate Marvin - Sweet Potato Soufflé Recipe

House, Garden, Madness
By Cate Marvin

Meeting his mouth made it so I had house again.
I called him garden and drew him so, grew
his long lashes like grasses so I could comb
them with my stare. Some evenings a low cloud
would arrive, hang its anxiety over the yard.

Having his mouth at mine again gave me back
home. The walls painted themselves blue
flowers grew larger than my head, stared
at me with wide eyes through the windows.
I was surrounded. A cloud stretched gray arms.

His mouth and mine again built something back
up with heat. The house was home again, wherever
I lived. The flowers grew fat, fed on weeds
around them. Ladybugs tucked their red luck
beneath petals' chins. The cloud came home again.

His eyes were closed but mine kept swinging open.
I saw him in the garden, surrounded by its light.
The flowers cut their own stalks, handed themselves
over to him in bunches. He kissed their bouquets,
and petals raptured. A cloud lowered, dark with fury.

I pressed my mouth to palm, closed my eyes
to find the garden, then saw: window shut in fright,
roots drowned, flower stalks broken, their heads dead
in puddles. Startled, I looked around. The cloud
descended, prepared to hemorrhage in my arms.

From: "Poetry Daily", page 173
first published in The Paris Review, no. 158, Spring, Summer 2001
also from "World's Tallest Disaster" by Cate Marvin

<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>

Madness is highly underrated.

I'd like to share my favorite, most requested Thanksgiving recipe passed down to me by my Mama.  As most Southern cooks do, I add or subtract spices to suit my taste.  (We're the best cooks in the world down here in Swamp country.) It tastes like a dessert, but it's a yummy side dish, best served with deep fried turkey, cornbread dressing, giblet gravy, homemade rolls and green bean casserole.  Oh, and don't forget the cranberry sauce.

I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving filled with love, family and friends.  Ray & I are alone this year, sadly... :-(

Love & Blessings to you all,

~Marion

=============================================

Mama's Sweet Potato Soufflé

3 cups mashed sweet potatoes (I used canned yams, but you can use fresh)
1 cup sugar (or Splenda, a sugar substitute)
2 eggs
1 Tablespoon vanilla
1 teaspoon of cinnamon  (you can also add nutmeg if you like)
1/2 teaspoon cardamom (my secret ingredient)
½ cup butter, melted

Mix the above ingredients well using hand mixer and pour into oven-safe casserole dish.

TOPPING:  (mix in separate bowl)

1 cup packed brown sugar (or Splenda Brown Sugar)
1/3 cup flour
1 cup finely chopped pecans (or walnuts)
1/3 cup butter

Melt butter in mircrowave.  Mix all topping ingredients together with a fork. It will be crumbly. Sprinkle mixture evenly over top of casserole mixture. Bake 30 minutes at 350 degrees or until golden brown on top.  Enjoy!!!

==============================

"The Pilgrims made seven times more graves than huts. No Americans have been more impoverished than these who, nevertheless, set aside a day of thanksgiving." ~H.U. Westermayer

*****

For each new morning with its light,
For rest and shelter of the night,
For health and food, for love and friends,
For everything Thy goodness sends.  ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

*****

"Thanksgiving dinners take eighteen hours to prepare. They are consumed in twelve minutes. Half-times take twelve minutes. This is not coincidence." ~Erma Bombeck

*****

"O Lord that lends me life,
Lend me a heart replete with thankfulness."  ~William Shakespeare

*****

Indigo Dreams by Marion

Indigo Dreams

By Marion Lawless

Purple Kale

Purple glass

Grape.

                  Indigo

                                   Indigo book---

                                   Indigo kitchen stools---

                                   Indigo mystery.

I drank Purple Russian Kale

in my plastic purple glass

and it transmogrified into

a misty, holy, Russian Mass

in a huge psychedelic cathedral with

melting stained glass windows.

                               ---imagiNATION

Modigliani was a poet;

his medium was paint on canvas.

He loved long-necked women

and Absinthe---green liquor

that took him to dream worlds---

Dearest poet, I love you the way 

purple loves the elusive indigo,

the way paint lusts for canvas and

the way words and ink crave paper...

the way my fingers love

the feel of dirt as I plant

eggplants and tomatoes.

I dream of touching your skin

the way sunlight caresses

the tips of the trees...

I think of your dark, long hair

tangled in a soft morning breeze,

your face upturned as words

come to you---pure & unfiltered.

I wake, 

eager to read them.

Marion L.

5/17/17

I Envy My Dolls

Inga Rose from Moscow, Russia

WORDS ARE THE DIMINUTION OF ALL THINGS
By. Charles Wright

The brief secrets are still here,
and the light has come back.
The word remember touches my hand,
But I shake it off and watch the turkey buzzards bank and wheel
Against the occluded sky.
All of the little names sink down,
weighted with what is invisible,
But no one will utter them, no one will smooth their rumpled hair. 

There isn’t much time, in any case.
There isn’t much left to talk about
as the year deflates.
There isn’t a lot to add.
Road-worn, December-colored, they cluster like unattractive angels
Wherever a thing appears,
Crisp and unspoken, unspeakable
in their mute and glittering garb.

All afternoon the clouds have been sliding toward us
out of the
Blue Ridge.
All afternoon the leaves have scuttled
Across the sidewalk and driveway, clicking their clattery claws.
And now the evening is over us,
Small slices of silence
running under a dark rain,
Wrapped in a larger.

——————————

My dissolving, brittle skeleton,
a pain-filled coat rack
for decaying flesh.
I envy my plastic dolls. ~Marion, 11/6/2019

**********

Louisiana Autumn, October Lullaby by Marion

My found rock with a message from the Universe for me.

Bleeding Heart Flowers

Louisiana Autumn

October Lullaby

A few brown,

desiccated, falling leaves---

lush, fragrant Lavender 

and feathery Yarrow yet

reaching skyward.

Endings woven

into Beginnings

and Circles breeding

Circles.

Moonflower seed pods

heavily pregnant with

next year's blooms.

Two hundred seeds

lying on my windowsill:

bountiful, generous

Autumn!

Beginnings woven 

into Endings

and Death breeding

Life.  Imagine!

Only the occasional Hummingbird

now at the almost empty,

red plastic feeders

rocking in the

80 degree breeze.

Such tiny enigmas,

sustained

on sugar water and

insects...headed further

South.

...and not surprisingly---

the only flowers 

yet still blooming

are the luscious

red-centered, sadly drooping

clusters of seemingly pulsing,

beating,

Bleeding 

Hearts.

10/11/16

Leaves Compared With Flowers by Robert Frost

I love the red veins in this dying leaf.

My first(!) rare blue Moonflower with Godlight shining, a highlight of this year.

Leaves Compared With Flowers
By Robert Frost

A tree's leaves may be ever so good,
So may its bark, so may its wood;
But unless you put the right thing to its root
It never will show much flower or fruit.

But I may be one who does not care
Ever to have tree bloom or bear.
Leaves for smooth and bark for rough,
Leaves and bark may be tree enough.

Some giant trees have bloom so small
They might as well have none at all.
Late in life I have come on fern.
Now lichens are due to have their turn.

I bade men tell me which in brief,
Which is fairer, flower or leaf.
They did not have the wit to say,
Leaves by night and flowers by day.

Leaves and bark, leaves and bark,
To lean against and hear in the dark.
Petals I may have once pursued.
Leaves are all my darker mood.

===============================

And who doesn't love Robert Frost?  We’re supposed to get our first frost at the end of next week.  October, where did you go?  

Love & Blessings,
~Marion

^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~

"If you would know strength and patience, welcome the company of trees." ~Hal Borland

The Addict by Anne Sexton

Anne Sexton at her writing desk

The Addict 
by Anne Sexton

Sleepmonger,
deathmonger,
with capsules in my palms each night,
eight at a time from sweet pharmaceutical bottles
I make arrangements for a pint-sized journey.
I'm the queen of this condition.
I'm an expert on making the trip
and now they say I'm an addict.
Now they ask why.
WHY!

Don't they know that I promised to die!
I'm keeping in practice.
I'm merely staying in shape.
The pills are a mother, but better,
every color and as good as sour balls.
I'm on a diet from death.

Yes, I admit
it has gotten to be a bit of a habit-
blows eight at a time, socked in the eye,
hauled away by the pink, the orange,
the green and the white goodnights.
I'm becoming something of a chemical
mixture.
that's it!

My supply
of tablets
has got to last for years and years.
I like them more than I like me.
It's a kind of marriage.
It's a kind of war where I plant bombs inside
of myself.

Yes
I try
to kill myself in small amounts,
an innocuous occupation.

Actually I'm hung up on it.
But remember I don't make too much noise.
And frankly no one has to lug me out
and I don't stand there in my winding sheet.
I'm a little buttercup in my yellow nightie
eating my eight loaves in a row
and in a certain order as in
the laying on of hands
or the black sacrament.

It's a ceremony
but like any other sport
it's full of rules.

It's like a musical tennis match where
my mouth keeps catching the ball.
Then I lie on; my altar
elevated by the eight chemical kisses.
What a lay me down this is
with two pink, two orange,
two green, two white goodnights.
Fee-fi-fo-fum-
Now I'm borrowed.
Now I'm numb.

=============================

“The whole notion of pain, and how every individual experiences pain, is up for debate. We don't know how another person experiences pain - physical pain or psychic pain. Some of these clinics where assisted suicide or euthanasia is practiced, they call it 'weariness of life.'”

Miriam Toews

I Am the Highway by Audioslave

What a magnificent Autumn Full Moon!  Wow!  Just...WoW! xo, Marion

———————-

“But even when the moon looks like it's waning...it's actually never changing shape. Don't ever forget that.” 
― Ai Yazawa, Nana, Vol. 14

———————-


I AM THE HIGHWAY
Audioslave

Pearls and swine bereft of me
Long and weary my road has been
I was lost in the cities
Alone in the hills
No sorrow or pity for the leaving I feel

I am not your rolling wheels
I am the highway
I am not your carpet ride
I am the sky

Friends and liars don't wait for me
I'll get on all by myself
I put millions of miles
Under my heels
And still too close to you
I feel

I am not your rolling wheels
I am the highway
I am not your carpet ride
I am the sky

I am not your blowing wind
I am the lightening
I am not your autumn moon
I am the night
night

Source: Musixmatch

Songwriters: BRAD WILK / TOM MORELLO / TIM COMMERFORD / CHRIS CORNELL

So Tired...

Getting old is exhausting...

My daughter, Sarah, and my smart, gorgeous granddaughter, Mary Mace, who is 15.