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CONNECTED VOICES
by Natalie Lobe
Connected Voices
March Street
Press, 3413 Wilshire,
Greensboro, NC /
rbixby@earthlink.net
47pps / 1-59661-044-1 / $9.00
Thrice segmented, the first is steeped in nature, as in "At the
Rim," teetering on the edge of the Grand Canyon, a
synonym for the peril of life, all enveloping, before
being cast to sea in "Glosa" - "where licorice
dolphins/play tag with ships and coral reefs" again, a
metaphoric play for the citified destruction of our
earth. "Every city a landscape of rubble,/every forest
smoldering ash./Then imagine the whole/ocean oil-choked
and stagnant,/pelicans shrouded in scum." Then "Moon
Uprisings" gives us a Pagan slant, albeit the scene "In
Beijing Park, toddlers/with full moon faces/and new moon
eyes/smile at long nose strangers/with Nikon hands."
Part two offers a glimpse of Jewish history and
tradition, from Israel to "Ellis Island circa
1920," where the mix of clothing customs perplexes the
anxious wife on board, 9 years after her "Yaakov" made
America his home. "The women in New York City, they
don’t wear/babushkas or fourteen petticoats" lamenting
that "When I am inside all that cotton/nobody's poke can
hurt me." And, inevitably, the Holocaust with her
evoking poem, in its entirety;
"Untitled"
No matter how hard she pulls
the wedding band will not slide
off her finger past the swollen joint.
The thick faced guard scowls,
Gehen, and then turns to the next.
Not worth touching the old Jew.
Clutching her sore left hand
she shuffles on.
Later, in the ash a gold circle glows
incongruous, defiant.
Part three brings us back to a perfect blend of
matriarchy, nature
and my favorite, "Henrietta's Garden." Lines of note;
She nurtured her garden with kitchen slops:
potato peels, apple cores, watermelon seeds
steeped inside a white pail half full of dishwater.
When the pail grew heavy with liquid muck
she flung her brew on the flowerbeds.
Vegetable seeds from the swill took root
pairing zinnias with cantaloupe, lilies with peas
...
The crazy quilt of purple, red, gold, green,
the fragrance of rose in zucchini,
finger-length beans, a cucumber's girth
still dazzle my brain.
Snippets of childhood into adulthood with a keen eye
for detail and a feel for emotion has this collection
ending, appropriately with "Ode to a Landfill" - "Keeper
of the past,/cracked vessels,/broken
bedsteads,/tarnished crass./Baby dolls/eyes gone" as I
fear we all, too, shall someday be. A strong fabric of
life, meant to last, to endure, to give history, to
evoke and to share.
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