Monthly Archives: April 2019

“Majesty” for April 13, 2019

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Majesty
       for my sister, Karla
  
 All winter, this view has comforted me:
 your photograph, on canvas, filled with green,
 palest blue sky, golds, and red glowing leaves,
 supported by lattices of tracery.
  
 You sent it for my bleak, frozen birthday,
 knowing mine falls when our branches are bare,
 knowing how our heavy skies glower grey
 as unpolished silver here. I can stare,
  
 up from understory to sun-fired glow:
 a tree circled by delicate vine, a view
 as heart-lifting as a stained-glass window.
 Today, on your birthday, I offer you
  
 heart-felt lines of thanks for the quiet majesty
 of your soaring spirit, your care, your artistry.
  
 Leslie Schultz

Regular Winona Media readers know about the keen ability of my sister, Karla Schultz, to find and capture images of the natural world. Her images are dazzling and humbling, and I am grateful for her permission to share them here from time to time.

For the past four years, I have been happy that, since Karla’s birthday falls on April 13, right in the heart of the National Poetry Writing Month marathon, I have had the perfect spur to concoct and share a sororal paean. Though I can’t be with her on her special day this year, I am happy to know that right now she is out with her cameras.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, KARLA!!!!

Earlier this morning…
Considering the patterns….
The artist’s signature…

“Landform” for April 12, 2019

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Landform
  
  
 Long ago, I lost it,
 the black camisole
 with a logo of Devils Tower
 stamped in silver. Still 
 it shimmers in memory,
 like a lost constellation.
 The logo was thin as a lichen,
 flaky. I saw little resemblance 
 to the landform
 that gave rise to it. Why 
 does it loom large?
 Perhaps because
 of the gossamer light 
 it continues to cast
 for me? Memory acts like
 a radio tower, broadcasting
 signals only I can (fitfully)
 hear: a triangulated tale—
 who I wanted to be,
 who I was really,
 whom I might still become.
 So, maybe, if I just stand 
 here, a little longer, 
 near up-surging 
 evidence—
 vanished lava and
 the Sundance Sea—
 I will unscramble.
 I will understand. 
  
 Leslie Schultz
public domain photo by Laura Lauer (pixabay)

“Jump Ropes” for April 10, 2019

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Jump Ropes

 Where did they go?
 They used to be everywhere
 in good weather,
 those wobbly parabolas.
  
 Little girls, holding
 one end in each hand,
twirled the ropes
 into spinning doorways,
 string lintels,
 stepping over them,
 rhythmically, lightly,
 over and over,
 carried by song.
  
 The beat of the rope
 against the hard ground
 kept time for the breath
 of the skipping girls.
  
 Where did they go?
 Into air?
 Into the ground?
 Into echoes 
 all around?
 Into cadences
 everywhere?
   
 Leslie Schultz

“Ichthyography” for April 9, 2019

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Ichthyography
  
What would it be like, the writing
 of fish? Something shining, I think,
 a muscular, flowing
 calligraphy, 
 a Piscean script—
 accents of whirlpool
 and fin flip.
  
 Shimmering, 
 colorful circumlocutions
 used, like kennings, over and over, 
 and with lots of sudden twists
 and turns in the plot, breaks
 long as winter, slower to resolve
than river fog rising.
  
 What would it be like 
 to write not with ink
 or light but with water?
 Describing each fresh syllable 
 with my whole body, then
 erasing it all as I go,
 every gesture a metaphor?
 
Leslie Schultz

“Honey” for April 8, 2019

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Honey
  
 Now comes the fall of glaciers, all fall down.
 Now comes the rise of blue, blue of the deepening sea.
 How do we rise to our task, stand common ground,
 in and out of nature, poison and key?
  
 Pavements are grey beneath us. Graffiti decks the walls.
 Fluorescents flare and sizzle, curdling night and day.
 Starlight seems to gutter, but still the moon calls,
 washing paths along the river silver-grey.
  
 The bees are falling silent. Iron gates gape wide.
 We have to seek within, clutching tattered maps.
 Can we summon our making powers deep inside?
 Invite new-made honey to fill burnt-out gaps,
  
 and return what we have eaten: instead consume
 flames of inspiration in a cleaner room?
 
Leslie Schultz
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