|
|
|
Celestial
Conversations
The moon, the stars, the sun,
they speak a language round
and filled with light.
It is orange and ochre,
ivory, bright as love.
It sounds like the sea,
soft and sibilant,
urgent and insistent.
It tells of the beauty in circles,
the globular o's of surprise,
the pleasure in elliptical patterns;
it points to the curve of belly, breast,
the cylindrical joints of elbow, knee,
the circumference of a toe,
the spherical nature of soul,
exalting speech as a gift.
Using the same words,
each has its own voice:
the sun's rich modulation,
its warm vowels, amber notes;
the moon's cool tone,
patterns like carved ivory,
intricate and fine; the high
sweet pitch of the stars.
Have
You Ever Stopped?
Have you ever stopped to imagine
the world as really spinning,
suddenly reached to grip
the sides of whatever is close:
a rail, car door, fence,
somebody's actual hand,
seen faces go by in a blur,
hair static and straight,
people's eyes sliding toward
noses, mouths into chins?
Have you ever stopped to try
-or try to stop-
the crazy spin toward tomorrow,
the sheer momentum
hurtling you faster and faster
toward the setting moon,
then the new, then the full,
never knowing, but seeing
it all, each atom magnified
into molecules of thought?
Have you ever stopped to think
of earth as a spiked ball,
its buildings and people sticking out
sharply at right angles
that might as well be left,
a deadly mace swung round
on an invisible chain?
And then when it was big and fresh
before you, did you stop
still, like a deer caught in light,
look straight into the sky,
the clouds unmoving, and see
the stars gleaming in the full sun,
visible at last?
Changing the Direction of Dawn
What if suddenly the world
stopped spinning clockwise
paused
for just a moment
then started turning the other way?
Would everything go in reverse?
Would our present turn back
to become our past
before we had a chance
to remember?
Would we never be absolved,
no chance to atone?
Would the sun rise in the west,
the moon take over day?
Would we
wake up to pale light
sometimes golden, then silver?
It is so easy to love in the dark.
Poem
© Barbra Nightingale 2004. All rights reserved.
|
|
Barbra
Nightingale has had over 150 poems published in journals and
anthologies, including Calyx, Kalliope, Many Mountains
Moving, Birmingham Review, Chatahoochee Review, Urban Spaghetti,
Liberty Hill Poetry Journal, Florida in Poetry,
The MacGuffin, Crosscurrents, The Kansas Quarterly, Cumberlands
Poetry Journal, Passages North, The Florida Review, The Palmetto
Review, The South Florida Poetry Review, Coydog Review, Red
Light/Blue Light, Voices International, Visions International,
The Poet,
Barrow Street and Tigertail: A South Florida Annual, and Barrow Street. She won the
1999 Stevens Poetry Manuscript Award for her first full
length collection, Singing in the Key of L. Her chapbooks
include, Greatest Hits (2000), Lunar
Equations (1993), Prelude to a Woman
(1986) and Lover Never Die (1981).
|
Portrait
of Barbra Nightingale © Henry Denander 2004. All rights reserved.
|
|
Poetry
Michael Rothenberg
Diane Thiel
Nick Carbo
Mia Leonin
Michael Hettich
Campbell McGrath
Kelle Groom
Steve Kronen
Kemel Zaldivar
Pris Campbell
Michael-Earle Carlton
George Murphy
Howard Camner
Geoffrey Philp
Terri Carrion
Nancy Knutson
Jonathan Rose
Barbra Nightingale
Ian Krieger
James Brock
Amy Serrano Zorrilla
Denise Duhamel
Virgil Suarez
Micro-Fiction & Shorts
Terri Carrion
Diane Thiel
Artists
Artist Intro
Ivonne Bess
Diego Quiros
John Canning
Jeff Filipski
Arlene Magloire
Cassandra
Gordon-Harris
Holly Picano
TRES
Mia Leonin
Terri Carrion
Richard Blanco
Interviews
Campbell McGrath
Previous Volume
Volume 16
South Florida Reads
PUERTA
|
