the bookmobile

Bookmobile
by Joyce Sutphen

I spend part of my childhood waiting
for the Sterns County Bookmobile.
When it comes to town, it makes a
U-turn in front of the grade school and
glides into its place under the elms.

It is a natural wonder of late
afternoon. I try to imagine Dante,
William Faulkner, and Emily Dickinson
traveling down a double lane highway
together, country-western on the radio.

Even when it arrives, I have to wait.
The librarian is busy, getting out
the inky pad and the lined cards.
I pace back and forth in the line,
hungry for the fresh bread of the page,

because I need something that will tell me
what I am; I want to catch a book,
clear as a one-way ticket, to Paris,
to London, to anywhere.

Joyce Sutphen, “Bookmobile” from Coming Back to the Body. Copyright © 2000 by Joyce Sutphen. Used by permission of The Permissions Company, LLC on behalf Holy Cow! Press, http://www.holycowpress.org

at the computer in the 1980’s

a caricature is an exaggeration of an outstanding characteristic

can you locate Jeanne’s outstanding traits?

curly hair to wrap

around long fingers and big

feet to fly “quicksilver”

 

Beauty and the Beast

illustrator: David Hillman

 

the diagonal tilt

enhances the teeth

the scepter

the pillows

lambskin

soft breasts in front of barbed wire!

 

all rights

quicksilver

6/16/2020

rubbing noses

illustrator: Elizabeth Rose Stanton

Take off the mask-and

rub the nose to the thigh, nigh

to the source of LOVE!

quicksilver

covenant

 

My First Golden Shovel Poem

 

Sanctuary in Christ Church, Hudson NY showing Mother Eileen in her vestment

Exterior of Christ Episcopal Church in Hudson NY

 

The Golden Shovel or the last word of every line is a sentence

The sentence:

Wear the sanctuary, the arc of the covenant, as your robe, strength, light, and power.

 

Poem:

Of all I choose to wear

I choose the

holy sanctuary

whose tent carries the arc of the covenant,

my most sacred robe,

strength

light

power!

shovel poem by Jeanne

Quicksilver 4/5/2020

rainbow woman and the surviver

rainbow woman

survivor man

 

digital man-rests

enlightenment comes

while rainbows carry both!

jp

 

By Joel Brouwer Nov3,2019 (Poetry Almanac)

He rose before her every morning
to walk three rainy February blocks
to the best and cheapest boulangerie.
Our secret, they said, and didn’t tell friends.
Bonjour Madame, bonjour Monsieur,
une baguette s’il vous plaît, oui Monsieur,
merci Madame, merci Monsieur.
The spell had to be pronounced perfectly
to accomplish the magic. By the time
he returned, she had everything ready,
the jam pots and butter, bowls of coffee.
Her skin still lustrous with sleep as she turned
toward him. He kissed her with his coat on, she
gleaming with heat, he with cold. I’m only
missing one thing, she said. Indicating
the black plastic basket on the table.

Joel Brouwer, “The Missing Thing” from And So. Copyright © 2009 by Joel Brouwer. Used by permission of The Permissions Company LLC on behalf of Four Way Books, http://www.fourwaybooks.com.

quicksilver

electronic portrait painting from Chris D’Orta

 

lettered by Jeanne Poland

Svitlana

illustrator: Svitlana Holovchenko

 

there are oceans to sail

and clear clear days to sail with

moonlight nights to sleep with

no cares at all

quicksilver

I am not my body…

A Deck of Pornographic Playing Cards

We were ten or eleven, my friend and I,
when we found them up under a bridge,
on top of a beam where pigeons were resting.
Someone had carefully hidden them there.
On each was a black-and-white photo,
no two cards alike. We grew quiet and older,
young men on our haunches, staring at
what we feared might be the future.
The pigeons flapped back to their roosts,
rustling and cooing. The river gurgled
as it slipped from the bridge’s cool shadow.
There were women with big muzzled dogs,
women with bottles and broom handles.
Stallions stood over the bodies of others.
The women smiled and licked their lips
with tongues like thorns. We grew old.
We were two old men with stiff legs
and sad hearts. We had wanted to laugh
but we couldn’t. We had thought we were boys,
come there to throw stones at the pigeons,
but we were already dying inside.
Ted Kooser
in Weather Central

 

Jeanne Poland in 2019

 

I am not my body

but holy outrage too

passionate beliefs-

that straddle the universe

golden light –

from my third eye to the tip of my toes

divinity-

that renders me eternal and able to transform

my body is a humble servant-

loyal for generations and sculpted by my tribe

Jeanne Marie Margaret DeLoca  Sr Virginia Mary of Christ  Poland  Smith

 

4/22/19

quicksilver