Literary journal holds launch party Califragile.org provides poetry relevant to the "modern world"
Category: Poetry
Water Dome Poetry of Place
For Jazzi
snazzy peaches,
I am so far and with you
from those shards of sunlight on icy fields
on cycling mornings that must be getting colder,
from here it is hard to believe that they exist:
landscapes away, I can try to imagine
the smokiness in the air and the stars after six,
the persimmons in the market and the dry mouths they leave behind,
the seasoned almonds on the kitchen tables: orange cinnamon, coffee, honey and lemon,
Boat Under the Orange Tree Poetry of Place
Under the orange trees,
he turned to me and said,
scratch that, all things are beautiful
could he feel
the kitchen table under my elbows,
the taut muscles of my father’s face
tendons like fists, then ropes
the wince, the rocking motion,
what an ugly thing
war is
fingering the dullness.
leaves of an olive tree,
a skirt that swallows dust,
a lime in a girl’s mouth,
skin stinging under fingernails
in the dives of birds over the orchard,
do I not love the world enough?
Sacred Poetry of Place
I. Indigo
Paint your city indigo
and place it at the heel of the mountains,
at the edge of the rainforest
Name it
for the twin peaks like horns,
or for a saint,
and pave it with cobblestone
Make a quiet
rainfall
and a silky
fog lift
and a sun that will
breakthrough
to reflect
whitewashed indigo
like the freshwater of the lakes in Chiapas
Build a place for prayer
on a hill overlooking the city
a mosque, or a raft
and climb or glide, but do not swim
when you hear the call to prayer —
Mélange Poetry of Place
Hind calls me mélange with a smile —
but on a crooked side street she likes my accent
and in the hammam she tells me I scrub like the Moroccans do
Her father and I cannot speak
in this house in the Ocean,
but he taps the table
when the sheep in the loft looks at me
and points to the cages
when the yellow birds sing
Gentle shriveled smile of dried fruit
He asks how many hours
from San Francisco to Rabat?
and how do you say in Spanish? and he points
borrego — borrego
until he gets it right
I think I have been here before,
inhale of ammonia and livestock,
folded hands on stained tablecloth
California Was Never Kansas Poetry of Place
I can’t tell anymore
where this valley ends and where my body begins
driving the length of california
I am shedding potentialities,
rejecting visions,
brushing off hallucinations from my lips and my waist.
not long until
skin ripping
from the contours of the buttes,
from this canyon like a womb
what they don’t know is that
my body
is malleable, transplantable
and what they don’t know is that
my body
absorbed this landscape,
acorn soup and antibodies,
poison oak immunity —
you would think I am native,
you would think I am what you are