poetry

No ordinary night

~ Bri Sperry-Renfrew ~ 6 Comments

Between the covers

Tom Petty lies beside me

Rolling Stone issue

It was a wretchedly extraordinary night. I wonder if I wounded Quotidian when I said I couldn’t see her in her name. Did she slink off like an animal? Did Extraordinary smell blood? She seems to be circling.

In the early morning moment when I was jolted awake by my screeching security alarm, it was no ordinary thing. Even in my son’s voice, which I have known from newborn cry to maturing man. His absent-minded distraction is not unusual these day – a girl is in the picture – but that sacred ray escaped my notice under the circumstances. The screeching was picking up speed, even as my fingers froze.

Then the phone. The calm voice wanted my Password. I’ve never used this password. My brain is packed with passwords.

Before long an urgent rapping on my front door brought me face-to-face with a badge on a blue uniform. Extraordinary is unabashedly mocking me.

 But then Quotidian appeared. At my feet. A tender tan-ish blade-shaped leaf unswept from my porch. She is a fragile and dusty wind-blown traveler. Her ancient heirs are innumerable, but the maiden voyage which landed her beneath my distraught gaze, ended with no fanfare.  She lay there. I spied her.

When the badge was gone, I swept her up with the friends who followed her, and with that simple rite, I obtained my bearings. My faith was restored. We are friends again.

Addiction

~ Bri Sperry-Renfrew ~ 4 Comments

A basket of unfolded laundry is perched slanted between the arms of the chair in my bedroom. Not an ordinary way for a laundry basket to sit – even in its disregarded state. It should be in the corner by the armoire – or in the closet under the empty plastic hangers. But there it sits. There.  All caddy-wampus and obvious – begging me to remember the solace I once took in its existence. I inhale, imagining. Fresh and faintly lavender. Soft, worn cotton – smoothing, folding, creasing, patting. Smoothing, folding, creasing, patting. Smoothing, folding, creasing, patting.  Bottle to drunk, needle to junkie, word to writer.

My taste for the ordinary and this oxymoronic word which describes it has fled. You, Quotidian, are no ordinary word. How dare you presume to climb into my jumbled, intoxicating basket?

Xanadu

~ Bri Sperry-Renfrew ~ 8 Comments

Xanadu is the first X word that popped into my mind.  I always associate Xanadu (the song, not the movie) with Olivia Newton John, never knowing until today that it is from Coleridge’s Kubla Khan.  Well, maybe I did know that in some hazy literature era of days gone by…At any rate, I’m glad I (re)discovered it today.

http://allpoetry.com/poem/8439799-Kubla_Khan_Or__A_Vision_In_A_Dream._A_Fragment-by-Samuel_Taylor_Coleridge

P: My PAT answer

~ Bri Sperry-Renfrew ~ 6 Comments

P at, my friend,

R eminded me when I was yet on N, that

E ven when our dreams fall flat or

S end us

S earching for some class or

      O nly serve to scare us

      N ight will pass away and Hope will

                    P ull me into dawn’s new day

                    R ays will shine and

                    E nd my fears

                    S he didn’t say it exactly like that

                    S he said two words, then

                          O ver again, and I am

                          N ow repeating them…in my own way

Loey Poetry – Black Leather Purse

~ Bri Sperry-Renfrew ~ 6 Comments

Down on the floor slouching

but smiling

is a black leather purse.

It has eyes.

Three little silver buttons

arranged in a circle

makes one.

Another three arranged in a circle

makes two.

The big happy squiggly grin is

made of a golden zipper.

It’s unzipped and looks like

it’s saying, “What’s up?”

I’m sure it’s full of car keys,

gum wrappers, hand sanitizer,

wallet, loose change, pens,

pencils, gift cards –

with 37 cents left –

hair ties.

So, this black leather purse has a

face and a belly

and that’s about it.

Despair? Wa-Hoo!

~ Bri Sperry-Renfrew ~ 5 Comments

For no good reason, I’ve been moaning and groaning, feeling sorry for myself, and generally having an off day.   Nothing like a little Billy Collins to bring me out of my funk…

Despair

So much gloom and doubt in our poetry/flowers wilting on the table,/the self regarding itself in a watery mirror.

Dead leaves cover the ground,/the wind moans in the chimney,/and the tendrils of the yew tree inch toward the coffin

I wonder what the ancient Chinese poets/would make of all this/these shadows and empty cupboards?

Today, with the sun blazing in the trees,/my thoughts turn to the great/tenth-century celebrator of experience,

Wa-Hoo, whose delight in the smallest things/could hardly be restrained,/and to his joyous counterpart in the western provinces,/Ye-Hah.

Alphabet Ride (for Loey)

~ Bri Sperry-Renfrew ~ 5 Comments

“May I have a word with you?”

said A to B and C.

“The only English word that works,”

said B to A and C,

“is the one that starts with C

and ends with me, the B.”

“That’s right,” said C

to A and B.

“Let’s get ourselves in line.”

“Do you mean to make the word,”

began the letter A,

“or to line up to get in

the word someone will say?”

“Oh, never mind,”

said B to C.

“A always thinks he’s first.

Riding in a cab with him

will surely be the worst!”