Terrestrial Illuminations by Constance Stadler

(for Duane Locke)


Grass tuft, will you not speak to me?
A blue and brown tit jumped on my table
Near the Arno and shared
.........................My sandwich
As a full bosomed poppy floated by.
Wilted corn stalks in vermillion light
Thrill as magic
Snowy egrets dance in pond surrender
To cabbage palms.
Flickers seeking to mate rustle, uplift
The molting oak branch.
Baby black snakes break their eggs
And slither in new born delight.
Beetle, I watch you, too
And gasp at the black rainbows
That o'er span the black rivers
Of your glowing wings
Oh why when I, so willing to
Yield to the luminescent
Beckoning of the
Firefly promenade
Should be so sashayed by?
Beholding Blake's sedimentary infinities
The 'mind-forged manacles'
Slip, a bit.
.........But London comes
With Ferris Eye and
Carnival freak shows leaving
Me wistful
For wild swan glimpse
Through
Refracted sky
In a puddle
Of stagnant rain water.


Constance Stadler, VA, USA