​​BRIDAL WREATH 


True name: spirea. But we say
Bridal wreath for the laden branches
Of its blossoms, a heaviness cascading like love or grief.
Promises made with purpose,
Serious as a gravestone that holds the long
Vesture of vows, kept or broken. How these flowers
Weigh the heart with an ambition
To outlast loveliness. How lacking scent, they conjure
The eye of the beholder. The way her dress
Rustled in the spring or the cleft
Of his chin, that first glimpse of accord,
The as-yet-unpossessed sexual intimacy.
The vast bushes stagger beneath
Their finery, their gusto
Of white on white clusters, how life
Enjoins us to grasp abundance,
To grasp and gladden, gorge on brevity.

One.
 
 
 
COUNTRY BURIAL

 
Blacktop to gravel to dirt
That in another season will surely
Sink a procession such as this.
Then the rutted grassy trail
Past a lone stone “Founded 1840”

The square cornered hole
Old words of solace and hope.
Each hand armed with a yellow rose
The final ammunition of love.

Five long haired daughters weeping
A poetic quintet to take the abstract view
Of an outsider here for duty’s sake.

Acres of standing corn encircle this
Upheaval of leprous stones
With vanishing inscriptions.

The husband looks poleaxed
Numb in his new suit
Bought for next month’s planned
Renewal of vows.


Tipton Poetry Journal

   
KAREN’S QUILT SHOP


BY CHANCE OR BY APPOINTMENT
Says the sign for Karen’s Quilt Shop
Spray-painted on the bricks
Of the Wasco post office.

I prefer by chance
Perhaps one day strolling
With no purpose and egad:
Here’s Karen’s Quilt Shop

And though I have no talent
For needles, I might go in,
Look over the fabrics, the skeins
Of colored yarns, the frames
To hold the work tight,
The batting that keeps a sleeper warm

The threads that can whip a life
In neat star shapes or maybe
The crazy kind.


Blue Unicorn