[translated from assorted baby languages…]
to P.L. Travers for her chapter “John and Barbera”
in Mary Poppins… (I did not forget)
he said I have a pearl-handled stillness
to sell you, clocks with vanilla moons and
suns inlaid.
curious bubble-gum emerald
no, amethyst rings in just your size;
broken glass from the gumball machine.
a Cracker Jack prize.
a few chess pieces under a valentine sky
on tracing paper;
an eggbeater churning the colours in the clouds.
the maps where silvered ships slipped through
and no one drowned.
striped candy.
a rhymed song merrily sung. and cherrily.
peachly. plum.
the wind through wild grasses; gift-wrapped,
the jeweled meridians…choose.
I said I’m in a painting by Currier and Ives;
the sky’s forever lemon, streaked with violet jam
when what I really want is the Impressionists-
and to live in a thatched house
arranging the lilacs forever in a pale blue vase
that doesn’t tip over.
but already the hour glass is breaking apart-
so that I’m the one and only
sifting these pink sands-
hauling this jar of peach bright pennies home
and shaking the glass globe
twice on Sundays
so that snowfall
swirls, still-somewhere, in the world.
and this is for the last ones in the Park
who forgot to wave as I
rounded their corner-
too sequined-charming or bundled up
to know that some choice diamonds
leaves and flowers go
never snagging at all
the glint of lilac
in the snow child’s snood…
where are they? did they break my heart?
or are they wreathed forever in an enchanted wood.
there God is. He won’t topple over.
soon you may want nothing but melting, too.
moire endpapers rose-threaded through-
for the white jade fairytales
you can’t read yet
(whispered my Mother filtering
sunlight through the trees…)
mary angela douglas 15, 19, 21, 24 june 2012
