Poem a Day, Week 9: Feb 26-Mar 4, 2022
Welcome to Sifting the Rubble's weekly blog and podcast of my poem-a-day challenge for 2022. I am your host, and poet, Emily Gibson. The poems for the 9th week, Feb 26-Mar 4, have a bit of a dark tone to them, borne of the brutal attack of Ukraine by Russia, and the ever-looming catastrophe of climate change. But I can't help also share my love for this world and all the creatures that inhabit it, through words. Without any fanfare, I'll let the words speak for themselves this week.
Welcome to Sifting the Rubble's weekly blog and podcast of my poem-a-day challenge for 2022. I am your host, and poet, Emily Gibson. The poems for the 9th week, Feb 26-Mar 4, have a bit of a dark tone to them, borne of the brutal attack of Ukraine by Russia, and the ever-looming catastrophe of climate change. But I can't help also share my love for this world and all the creatures that inhabit it, through words. Without any fanfare, I'll let the words speak for themselves this week.
Poem #57, Feb 26, 2022
Sandpiper Synergy
A flock of feeding sandpipers
swoops up
suddenly,
saving themselves. A
synchronized air ballet,
moving in unity
like a field of wheat
responding to wind’s breath:
origin of impetus mute.
One wing rustles,
they all rustle.
One takes flight,
they all follow.
Trust.
They move, swerve, fold, double-back…
together.
How do they know?
Who is in charge?
Could be a hive mind. Or
a butterfly effect, perhaps, such that
one bird’s shifting
moves the entire flock
as each, in turn, adjusts.
Sandpipers competing to lead,
to be the pied piper of pipers,
would cause a catastrophe of
mid-air collisions
for all.
That fleet, fantastic flying,
together,
How do they know?
Who is in charge?
Could be a hive mind. Or
a butterfly effect, perhaps, such that
one bird’s shifting
moves the entire flock
as each, in turn, adjusts.
Sandpipers competing to lead,
to be the pied piper of pipers,
would cause a catastrophe of
mid-air collisions
for all.
That fleet, fantastic flying,
together,
only exists when
self-identity subsumes.
Ego, motivation, ambition
are foreign languages.
No place for a violence of
beak or wing, an
usurping of a neighbor’s sand flea.
Instead, one moves in,
the other moves out,
magnets flipped to the same pole.
There’s always another sand flea,
a new spot of beach to be in.
Besides,
such synergy
banishes loneliness.
self-identity subsumes.
Ego, motivation, ambition
are foreign languages.
No place for a violence of
beak or wing, an
usurping of a neighbor’s sand flea.
Instead, one moves in,
the other moves out,
magnets flipped to the same pole.
There’s always another sand flea,
a new spot of beach to be in.
Besides,
such synergy
banishes loneliness.
About this poem: Inspired by a video of sandpipers on the Jersey Shore that came across my Facebook feed. I was thinking about what humans could learn from sandpipers, influenced by Russia's actions this week. The beach I spent a portion of my childhood exploring had sandpipers, too. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7XmFIdhtvw&t=1s
Poem #58, Feb 27, 2022
Horses Like Shaved Ice, Too
I admire a sheet of ice
3 inches thick,
Insulating a stock tank,
A hole carved out,
Horse muzzle size.
I test the water--it’s
Warmer than air on
This sub-freezing day.
Crumbs of ice on top could be
Dust of snow or sleet.
But a drinking horse shows me
Different, as he delights in
Making his own shaved ice to eat.
Scraping incisors on slab
With great force,
I admire a sheet of ice
3 inches thick,
Insulating a stock tank,
A hole carved out,
Horse muzzle size.
I test the water--it’s
Warmer than air on
This sub-freezing day.
Crumbs of ice on top could be
Dust of snow or sleet.
But a drinking horse shows me
Different, as he delights in
Making his own shaved ice to eat.
Scraping incisors on slab
With great force,
Then delicately nibbling the crumbs.
Once more, with greater force
He grates at the ice.
Crack!
The entire slab heaves in two,
Sinking along the midline
Like an iceberg-impacted ship.
Once more, with greater force
He grates at the ice.
Crack!
The entire slab heaves in two,
Sinking along the midline
Like an iceberg-impacted ship.
Initial shock subsides to curiosity.
He laps at the water
Oozing up,
Pooling on the ice,
Satisfied.
He laps at the water
Oozing up,
Pooling on the ice,
Satisfied.
About this poem: Inspired by a real encounter with my horse and ice. I am grateful for moments like this so full of delight.
Poem #59 Feb 28, 2022
Relative Atrocities
Earth’s creatures all
inflict atrocities
in their quests for
sustainment,
nourishment,
continuance of offspring.
A sandpiper guts a swath of tiny crabs
leaving the tides to clean up its
wash of upended carcasses.
A spider sets a beauty of a web
to wrestle and tussle a fly midair,
bundling its prey neatly to drain later.
A bear stands mid-waterfall, pawing and
gobbling salmon of spawning age, its
slaughter running the river red.
Yet the human creature
alone
inflicts atrocities
unrelated to life’s
sustainment,
nourishment,
continuance.
A suffering reigned
down on
family and
kinsmen,
neighbors and
strangers,
in the name of what?
Power? Control? Status? Runaway ego?
Such atrocities are truly an abhorrence.
A stain on
the tablecloth
of life.
About this poem: Inspired by a text-exchange with my brother, after he read the Sandpiper Synergy, and commented about how they ate crabs. I sat up in bed while trying to go to sleep, and wrote the first 6 lines of this poem before I lost them. I was trying to write about how the violence inflicted by other creatures in quest for survival is so different from the violence humans inflict on each other in service of power and ego.
Poem #60, Mar 1, 2022
Bathroom Window Spider
Jane the outdoor spider set up housekeeping
in the tiny window of our equally tiny bathroom,
keeping insects at bay and graciously devouring
flies we gifted from other windows in other rooms.
A brown so dark she looked black,
but she was no black window.
We checked our book, Spiders and their Kin.
Her cottony egg sacks, once laid,
made her abdomen look small,
appearing every 6 months or so,
after a random spider, smaller, with pedipalps,
passed through on his random route of the house.
These sacks gifted the backyard with
fleets of ballooning spiderettes, once
pulled out the open window by a crosswind
made by the front door on a sunny, dry day.
For many years she, or an offspring,
graced that window with neat webs,
listening to our 1-sided conversations,
as if we humans were her kin.
appearing every 6 months or so,
after a random spider, smaller, with pedipalps,
passed through on his random route of the house.
These sacks gifted the backyard with
fleets of ballooning spiderettes, once
pulled out the open window by a crosswind
made by the front door on a sunny, dry day.
For many years she, or an offspring,
graced that window with neat webs,
listening to our 1-sided conversations,
as if we humans were her kin.
About this poem: Inspired by memories of our house spider, named Jane by our mom, which were triggered by a spider in the corner of a window by my desk, distracting my writing by capturing a small insect. Our mom would often talk to Jane in a sing-song voice as she deposited an insect for Jane to hunt. Jane lived with us for many years, and I remember when we found her, life gone, sitting in her web. I am sure that our relationship with Jane was influenced by Charlotte's Web.
Poem #61, Mar 2, 2022
Where is my Prize?
Where is my prize
for not going after the oligarchs
with pitchforks and guillotines?
Those whose endless quest for
more, more, more,
form the roots of
so much tragedy.
Surrounding us all,
selfish deeds driven by selfish wants
overwhelming Earth’s capacity
to adjust:
rising seas disappearing island nations,
raging fires with 12 month seasons,
starving polar bears swimming for ice,
bleached gardens of corals no more,
scorched lands blasted to smithereens
to shift borders 2 feet forward or back
at the whim of despot warlords.
There is no prize,
for allowing billionaires
access to power, unchecked.
As if I could, with my puny life,
influence those who want for nothing
yet consume the world on greed.
If there was a prize, I
couldn’t take it with me, anyway,
when everything we know turns to dust.
As it all will, one way or another,
whether I take out the
capitalist lords,
or not.
About this poem: Inspired by a writing prompt "Where is my prize for...." and the war Russia is enacting on Ukraine.
Poem #62, Mar 3, 2022
A Larch Warning
Yes, you want a larch tree!
The beauty of an evergreen
paired with the
brilliant fall colors of a deciduous!
Match made in heaven if you are a bird
seeking safe roost,
or a squirrel racing from tree to tree
on lean branch highways.
But if you have a garden
in the same yard, do take another thought.
A larch’s needles do not decompose
as dropped leaves do.
They make a thatch,
evade the tines of rakes
and turn soil against growth.
A larch will rain cones down
with no seasonal bounds,
and splintery branches break
in the slightest wind,
making mowing a lawn an ordeal.
A larch is most beautiful the end of winter
white bark laced with red buds
of all the needles to be shed in fall.
Let this be a warning to all.
About this poem: Inspired by two larches, one I see in my neighbor's yard across the street, looking stunning framed against blue winter skies with its red buds strewn along white bark. The other in our backyard, making gardening or lawn care difficult if not impossible.
Poem #63, Mar 4, 2022
A Study in Rust and Pine
A mountain, shrouded, a
shawl of fog which drops,
revealing a cap of white.
Slopes draped in snow,
shielding all color, save
rust of bark and green of needles
A stark landscape, softened
by the smoothness of ice crystals
settled in every crevice.
A Study in Rust and Pine
A mountain, shrouded, a
shawl of fog which drops,
revealing a cap of white.
Slopes draped in snow,
shielding all color, save
rust of bark and green of needles
A stark landscape, softened
by the smoothness of ice crystals
settled in every crevice.
About this poem: Inspired by views out the window as we drove to Salem and back for a medical appointment.
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