Poets Salon: A Different Kind of Spring

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POETS SALON

Who enters here? Caltech Roses! (Photo – Kath Abela)

– 04/23/20

Hosted by Kath Abela Wilson

We leave home for twenty minutes, a walk on the deserted campus. Everything is blooming. My husband says, I think of these roses, more colorful and more beautiful than ever, and almost no one sees.

fortunate ones
for now
Spring dances…

~ Kath Abela

A Different Kind of Spring (Photo – Cheryl Hoffman)

Peter Jastermsky

bird song
from all directions

across town
the farmer’s market
holds a vigil

for its vendors

Ο

seduced
by its cover

we open a book

still willing
to commit
to the unknown

Ο

a morning
without headlines

walking out
into a world
that Spring still

remembers

Ο

polishing
the stretch bike
a dad and daughter

all arms and legs

when they pedal into
her next dream

By now, with days of mind-numbing news, I’ve adjusted to a life made quieter and more solitary by crisis. In a way, being safely holed up in the desert is not so different than usual daily life, except that trips to stores are very limited and my family and I are more focused on basic survival needs. But, we are all healthy! Daily walks are still possible. And, on a good day, the poetry still flows, as do the hopes for a world to soon heal.

Ο Ο Ο

Arden-Terrace, Sacramento, CA (Photo – Louis Osofsky)

Louis Osofsky

no longer
cuddled by news
my silence
metastasizes
into shivers

Ο

I walk five steps
in one direction,
electric lights
flicker
and I walk five more back

Ο

breathing,
I disturb
my boundaries
of inside
and out

Ο

leaning forward
I turn to a photo
and smile
as if I hear
your thoughts

Ο

between
wholeness
and brokenness
we’re together
by staying apart

Ο

writing with a groan,
my coming out of the earth
and not into it,
I’m born of opening blooms
written in my bones

Ο

so quiet
this path lit
morning
even this wish
this walk

Ο

everything bleeds,
my fingers run
across
the heart-rock
to entice it out of silence

From my reading last night“…”

Perhaps it is the confusing, nuanced, mad tongue of the preposterous that writes new stories, that loosens the grip of the familiar, and allows new ways of perceiving – and thus, new ways of co-creating reality. In a way, being factual is what we do to stop ourselves from tipping over with giddiness. And in these times of frightening crises, we could use a little giddiness. I speak and write because I am easily overwhelmed, frequently brought to tears, and often hungry for silence. I speak and write because life is intoxicating – best served with lisps, and ponderous silence, and quizzical glances, and hand gestures that say ‘I don’t know’, and stammering precision.”
~ Bayo Akomolafe
“These Wilds Beyond Our Fences: letters to my daughter on humanity’s search for home” [2017]

Ο

Different Kind of Spring (Photo – Cheryl Hoffman)

A Different Kind of Spring: Quotes and Credits

An award-winning cherita poet and a Best of the Net and Dwarf Star nominee, Peter Jastermsky’s writing has been widely published. Peter’s haiku and senryu collection, Steel Cut Moon, is published by Cholla Needles Press. His chapbook of haibun, No Velcro Here, is published by Yavanika Press. Peter lives with his family in the high desert near Joshua Tree National Park.

Peter Jastermskys poems here are cherita, a six line story form, created by ai li, who lives in Singapore and UK, in honor of her grandparents, who were great storytellers. She is choosing a new Lockdown Cherita every day, from one of the monthly journals , working forward , starting from the inaugural edition in June, 2017, to now. They speak strongly to our own lockdown experience now. You will find Peter’s work there, along with many other wonderful poets.

Louis Osofsky lives in Sacramento, CA. He says:

these clouds
of Sacramento
blurred,
I cannot say how
but exquisite somehow

♣ Send your submissions by midnight Sunday, Pacific time, on the theme: “Our Sense of Time“, “Finding A Good Mood“, “What Can a Poet Do?“, “What Can You Do with a Poet?“, or suggest your own theme. Send short poems, haiku, senryu, tanka, cherita haibun, tanka prose, short prose poems, etc., or your own unique approach, to Kath Abela by Facebook message or click here to email her directly. We can feature your work again after five months. Multiple Submissions can be saved to appear later:

1. Send a short bio, comments on the theme.
2. Send photos or artwork by you, if possible.
3. No attachments except photos.

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