In a Name and A Poet

The Poetry Bus is on the road with Jeanne Iris at the wheel! Jeanne's challenge, in part, is to ruminate on the origins of our names and see what comes to mind. Check Revolutionary Revelry to read the full challenge and see who else is aboard...and keep reading here to see my (very) weak takes on the prompt. We're among friends, right?


IN A NAME

Adam’s chin ran apple juice.

So what? Would Eden stand

If Eve had offered,

Say, unspellable potato?

Would grief be gone

Were Romeo called Capulet?

Would longing for a kinsman

Not put cankers on that rose?

A name is not a thing;

I am not etymology,

Though, By God, given half a chance,

I would be queen.

The name Karen is of Greek origin, a variant of the original name Catherine and means pure, clean. The name is often associated with queens, of whom Catherine of Alexandria, Katherine of Aragon, and Catherine the Great are most famous.


A POET

More than anything

I want to be,

Eye and heart and ear,

A poet.

I want to see

What others fail

To see;

I want to split

Myself open

And hear.

I want to be

A lake where

Shadows fleet.

I want to seine

Feelings through

My teeth;

I want to drain

Away the spillage

And the dross.

I want to drown

In the world’s

Loss.

I want to be,

More than anything,

A poet.

love letters

I want to

move my fingers

over your

smooth grammar

caress your

long vowels

wrap myself

in your

strong syntax

pull your

discourse

to my breast

fold you up

tuck you

in the pocket

of my heart

uncrease you

in the dark

decode you

over and over

again.

Sorry for Sunday

I went walking with the wind,

Blowing through the bowers,

Floating far afield,

Following the flowers.

I ran before the rain,

Skipped ahead of showers,

Played along the path,

Whiled away the hours.

I was climbing to the clifftops,

Traversing mountain towers,

Standing on the summit,

Praising nature’s powers.

So sorry for the Sunday

My wandering walk devoured;

I welcome words of worship

If found among the flowers.

The House of the Poet

Every morning, the poet
leaves her house
to search the hills for
one perfect flower-
a yellow buckwheat,
the white-haired leather flower,
or mountain pimpernel,
tenacious specimens that cling
and root deep into the mountain.
Higher she climbs and higher,
turning over loose shale
that bounces from the backs
of the beasts that clack and rattle below.
Nothing lives on the barrens,
only the dust that stains her
black as the coal running in the veins.
By night, she wanders claustrophobic rooms,
preparing labels for empty jars
and writing epitaphs for garden walls.
Flowing formations growl
within the belly of the earth,
but no words guard the door
to the house of the poet.