New Year's Eve/Day Toast, An Emerald One

well it's click, click, click of the ruby heels
Good Glinda in a froth of pink
the wand waved over all your worries

that's what I think.
it's seeing spots before your eyes
like emerald sequins

when the curtains come down
it's like saying goodbye
when you don't want to

goodbye. and you don't know how.

here's to Kansas or the way home.
the balloon adrift and the oh no
then you wake yourself up from the lucid dream.

here's to all the beauty you've ever seen
all the friends in a  lovely disguise.

won't they be surprised to see you
again, when the curtains rise

when the dear earth chimes
or your part of it.

mary angela douglas 31 december 2019

Repaired

on a reef of ivory and of gold
a ship has foundered
and in its hold

transparent apples.
so I will scold the grey white feathered waves
o.

bring my ghost ship home.

on a day of silver and of brass
I cry without knowing
oh, alas

a ship has foundered
that I once knew
and what I thought were lies

are true
no mending basket
no household task

can mend what I
believed was past
according to the signs I knew

dear Lord can you
reverse it all
All Time I mean

I am too small
but through my spyglass I can see
my ghost ship still

by your decree
I hope to see it in the bay
on some forgiven spring bright day

and you and I will count the host
of all that I have loved the most
and all the treasure there.

bring to a crystalline repair.

mary angela douglas 30 december 2019

I Had Been The Rose Tree

I had been the rose tree and the white rose too

the red rose white rose twined in the story

by all stories end



that will not end with me

in the rose red rose white music

that trills on



under the signet of the crystal Bear

rainbow shimmering in thin air

the very North Star.



the emblem of where you are, my soul

Orion bought with the price of tears

threaded through recriminating year

from the beginning

silver dipped out from the Great Dipper

with the young winds in my hair



the folkloric skirts

the tiny jackets

made for elves



and hand embroidered.

I could wear those well;I did.

with shoes dyed to matc



from the berries in the field.

this is a misreading you say

in your off green vest



your turned up shoes

dressed for Success



your restlessness, ill defined

your pruned back vines

you slithery so and so



dont you think I know



who are you nibbling the door down

on my acquarium's castle any time you just seahorse feel like it

grieving the flowery borders brocade



that you stage a fit at because it's mine

stamping it into bits

breaking the crystal of the stream.

into dollhouse mirrors

from dream to altered dream

puckering every seam

your name is envy.

thinking you're right on time.

with your poisoned rosy apples.

you are not wanted here.

you'll have to disappear.

I know I've made it clear.


mary angela douglas 29 december 2019

I Will Praise In You The Idiosyncracy Of Snow

I will praise in You
the idiosyncracy of snow on april blooms
the rose of sunrise

and the grey skies down.
and then at once
the other way around.

no tombs are Thine.
the everlastingly Divine.
the breath of life in spearmint winds

the resurrected
all adrift at sea still praising Thee
the blue green of icebergs

and more than these

and everything otherwise

the steadfast zaniness of saints.

the picture palace and Mussorgsky
the gold of the heart recalled in the tolling bells
the black sea swells

the desolate autumn..

bitter the scent of zinnias still
the fading of the whippoorwills
I will praise on

in covert music till the last dawn.

mary angela douglas 29 december 2019

The Strawberry Cone In The Picture Book, Topped By The Pistachio, Topped By The Golden Vanilla

we began early with the ideal
as opposed to real life at school
where sometimes despite the

grownups best efforts
to pin us down in our desks
we would float upwards

children of the space age
with the fairy tale tinge still about us
in our Golden Age.

how to explain these tendencies
without, haha, reverting to psychology.
oh let's not refer to psychology

in this poem or any other.
let's be free
to not return to the subject at hand

observing the members of the band
on the bus after school
with their flutaphones.

I will play upon said flutaphones
remembering the images of ice cream
in various picture books

circa the 1950s
oh, take another look, also at the balloons...
was their ever in real life

ice cream this fluffy, colours this extravagant.
oh welcome child to the inner pageants.
it's eternal ice cream

no matter how it seems otherwise.
no matter how much

you wore out that page
no matter whether the backdrop
is at the zoo near the lion's cage

at the school fair or the county one
where everyone comes for the blue ribbons fluttering
or the cake walks or musical chairs

your eyes are fixed only there even in the comics

with Lulu, on the perfect cone.
there it is again.
in strawberry almost frothing wonder

topped by the pistachio, and then the golden cream
of vanilla or nearby fragrance of the sarsaparilla
I know it tastes better than anything else at the circus,

birthdays notwithstanding
and I bless the illustrator from my heart
and I want to declare in a Whitman like way

in a song of myself
not the elf on the shelf
with Plato stating the ideal forms

this is the form of the ideal
triple decker ice cream cone
imprinted in my soul

let it be emblematic forever
painted always like the Paradiso
in the same creaminess never dripping

never slipping from the cherishing hand

and filled in
in the everlasting colouring books virgorously,
in the neverlands

using our best crayons the best we can

to the heart's delight
in the heaven of heavens.

mary angela douglas 29 december 2019

The Nail Polish Of The Storybook Princess Doll

maybe it seems to you a small thing.
in my view, nothing is.
I remember our dolls had nail polish

painted on. the Madame Alexander ones.
it did seem a necessary detail fresh out of the Christmas box.
we were glad it was taken care of.

glad for the magnificent doll
dressed and looking like the opera singer Lily Pons who
had velvet embroidery on her cloud light

gown, pale pink velvet roses, light green velvet leaves
on every square of organza with a diamond like tiny
rhinestone at the center of each flower,

each pale square.
a pink satin sash and petticoats beyond compare
a picture hat with roses

teardrop pearl earrings
and auburn hair, like ours.
she was the princess.

though we never called her that.
it is impossible now not to think
she was the veritable Fairy Queen.

yet she had revlon red nails.
something jars when I remember that.
they should have been the palest shell pink, I think.

to match the roses.
yet her demeanor was sweet.too sweet
in realms beyond the professional.

she never could have worked in offices
the dress codes alone...think of it

though I did not know that then.
I mean, if she had fallen on hard times.
despite her typing skills

this we never thought of at that time
when we looked up to her as the paragon doll.
time being so eternal then awash in fairy tales

and unexpected chimes I still miss,
I confess

with all details taken care of
more or less.

mary angela douglas 28 december 2019

Maybe I'll Turn Myself Into A Cloud

maybe I'll turn myself into a cloud
a cloud that never rains that cannot weep
and drift and fling my rosy shadows

on the ground through the pink skies
where the roses have their heaven
I used to think when I was six or seven

and I shall sweep above the little children now
looking up from play in their backyards
who perhaps even a little start to dream

that way
as though when trouble comes
we all may be allowed to run away,

to live in the sky.
and watch the earth
keep spinning by

spinning its sad gold
forlorn in its blues and greens
its tides of mist

and on its own
while we get off scot free
in realms of mystery.

until on silken ladders of the wind
on some kite's kinder winding it all down day
we shall descend

to happiness again.
as reigning monarchs
in a summer's shade.

mary angela douglas 28 december 2019

The Lady of Shalott

(for Alfred Lord Tennyson)

space curves back into her embroidery
so that she sees only the work before her
and nothing directly

everything at a slant
or within a thousand veils
or mirrors refracting

shining and shining

and this is art

and where her heart must rest.
and if she strays it will be only into distress
and not the wooded path

bedecked in flowers she imagines
or time filled to the brim with charming hours
but she mistakes

one day distracted is enough to die on
the outward view for the inner
and the path of doom sets in;

the lady floating now between two worlds
receives from Lancelot merely a passing glance
a phrase in the minor key askance

she has a lovely face he muses for a little space
wedded as he is to surface as she was to depth;
irreconcilable! oh beyond mead!

she floats on a river of glass that's breaking now
oblivious toward comprehending Mercy
through Eternities.

mary angela douglas 27 december 2019

The Wild Swans

perhaps she was held aloft by threads of the mystic blue and green
or by her dreams prophetic
beckoning to the secret task

as much as by the beating of their wings, the wild birds
her brothers, formerly, enchanted now
and she must undertake their freedom somehow

though the thorns she weaves
won't only break the skin
but her frail heart.

work through the dark of the world 
the handiwork of light
the angels cry.

then leave her.
she finds the nettles near the mosses easily
but concealment is impossible

she must endure
the mockery of those
impure who trick and trip her in the lanes

and those from the underworld revived.
who beg the question  of the feeling of 
still being alive

till in her heart pale birds arise
and cry the cry of centuries denied
the light of the inner sky

the silver bells
the landscape where
all beauty dwells, so unrecovered still.

mary angela douglas 25 december 2019

The Last Note Rising At The End of Crystalline Song

for Hans Christian Andersen

I shall break myself into pieces of the star brimmed foam
the sea maid sighed all on a wave
with a fond look home

foundling, coral kingdomed and beset with human woes
bartering pieces of moonlight
bartering pieces of moonlight

for a violet repose

this is the wave resounding
and her presence fled.

this is all she said.

mary angela douglas 24 december 2019

I Don't Have To

what am I sposed to say
to the ever diminishing day
to the clouds when they drift away

when the clocks dont rhyme that way
when the birds drean out of tune
and I can't find the broom

to sweep my heart of gloom
and all the news is doom
quick banish time

in a new old rhyme
with the silver and gold
in the ship's sweet hold

and the wind skips through
and the world is new
and I just sit

still a part of it
all Glory around
not a single sound

I dont have to say a thing.

mary angela douglas 24 december 2019

For Helen Keller Seeing All

spelling the blue clouds indistinguishable from skies
I may come to the sense of things seen never with my eyes
but understood

the leafblown missionary green of woods
the cinnamon of earth, the blowing tide
the secret tolling of an inner bell

inside all spelling done
I had come to love so well

before they ever ever sang
to me the names of God the sweet mild sun
and then the floods came down

like liquid doves fluttering

in the touch of water and vividness arose
to link my heart to the name of the rose
the utterance divine, all things now

beneath their shapes reveal
the cut of orange and the orange peel
the waves of light illimitable

the message of small birds
the weight and heft of language
on the things unheard.

mary angela douglas 24  december 2019

For Isak Dinesen, Her Incomparable Stories

threading words like pale pink diamonds
roseate through old demesnes
will the bearers of this message

sink or swim or just explain
will they vanish disappear
love the ghosts from nameless years

in the story find reprieve
in the richness of its seams
tidewater of the fading stars

does it mirror where you are

human hearts across the bar;
antiquated though it seems
just now waking from their dreams

bright enameled on each page
from a quite mercurial stage

from a realm none else could mine
looping shadows over time
quests forgotten lore renewed

emblematic of the few last- lost- curios...

chiming bells, an attitude
caught that moment in the light
anecdote or wrong set right

Edens green the long goodbye
will the princess even cry
there the countess, there the lie

there the vow that must not die
families of heraldic sin

ice floes at the story's end
when the sweethearts must depart
farther than the story's arc.


mary angela douglas 23 december 2019

When You Have Forgotten

someday breaking into the last supernova
some imagine their fate that way
spieled across the skies

an unmitigated display

my spelling is more backward
in pale green in Renaissance sighs
scrawled in the snow by the twiglike

birds imprint, of a fairytale disguise
not breaking into print, more glasslike,
bubbled on the wind

the beginning just
of a flowered Capital
shyly  devised my friend;

on a rickety staircase

trailing the dust of roses, primroses?
why do they laugh at ancient poets 
even as a child it made me sad

then there's the ghost that comes out
shaking the holly berries and you clatter with cold
and you say, this isn't old;are you mad?

it's dripping with gold, the honey stored for you 
oh petulant man in a thousand thousand springs
when you have forgotten

all you can of the slow days of Grace.
or never read it rightly in the first place.

mary angela douglas 23 december 2019

The Herods of Art Defied

the beautiful thing preserved in God's own amber
is the subject of my poem today

because on earth there were too many herods
cutting the unbudded rose away

and who knows what else before dawn
hauled before their firing squad in its luminescence still
and made to pay and made to go

permanently away
then the king is so happy
until the wisemen say

oh we have seen some Star in the East..

how else the mystery
the beautiful artist discovered too late
long gone from the gated earth

the earth that makes him wait or her
and wait and wait and languish
with no pay no sigh of recognition

in his day or hers.
be sure the angels notice this iniquity.
how else do the pure

endure.

mary angela douglas 22 december 2019

Unexpected Radiances

the tragic creeps through a different keyhole than this
said alice carefully in my half dream
that comes and goes with the roses

what if ive read the wrong directions

or if I put the key in wrong so that it halfway turns
on a dungeon song

let me think it through she implored the clouds

floating over
the ruined battlements where the violets peeked through
how does time elapse in dreams, in you

do we collapse in colours painting the living stream
ourselves or

it flits from scene to scene
dissolves with no conclusions
find the slipstream through

to the garden where the birds sing
an interrupting music you are glad for.
yet the tragic creeps through

the least crevice, cornice seeping
down to the willows river strewn
and this is my half finished tune

through the same crack could come
all glorious the morning sun
in rose and amber

could roses clamber over the stone
and we cup the iris moment in our hands,
momentously

no way said the schoolmaster to elude the gloom
in the play
when the heroes are struck down this way

but I, said alice in my alice blue gown
learned better.
it's all deceiving weather

on the darkest day
pooled in your vast dear tears
the key in the lock could

click into unexpected radiances.

mary angela douglas 22 december 2019

A Winter Scene from The Little Match Gril (by Hans Christian Andersen)

and if I warm my hands
at the grate of what is to come
perhaps there will be no sun

or a winter sun
that shines yet chides me.

if I warm my hands
it is against that light
that came so long ago

in Bethlehem where God Himself the Sun
revealed the Star.

though I am here
I am not really;where they ask
when they pass if they ask at all

who are you
except I warm my hands

against that night
when all of darkness
was blasted by the Light.

mary angela douglas 20 december 2019

Creche

You're my Jesus in a manger
the shepherds and the mild sheep too
my angels singing out of glory

my Star, my song the onderstruck few.
you're my wandering and my fate
the Star that vanquished half the night

rose Of Jesse, root of sorrow
undertaken for my sake.
light my way in public housing

find my stall
though they unhouse me
in the stille nacht

come near
though everything should disappear
still your heart I ever seek

as when a child
my soul you'd keep.
come this Christmas near or far

Father you, whom nothing marrs.
even in this dubious year
you will keep me from all fear.

mary angela douglas 18 december 2019

No!

The Son of God was not born

so that little children could only sing snow carols at school

so that they could laugh at Santa Claus

his belly that jiggled like jelly ho ho

The light of the world in a free country

oh we must not breathe his name

in the public square for public shame

we must not offend we must be sensitive and aware

of others feelings 

who could be offended at the

message of love and peace

of relief from endless grief.

cloud shallow we must remain

and trending

in denial never ending

though angels crowd the skies;

must we submit to lies?

pretending he never came

so that we can all get along

stifling our Christmas song

and all the heralding

the candle lit within the Soul

ignoring for this rigmarole.

No I answer.

NO!

mary angela douglas 17 december 2019

Dirge

dear customer Im oh so glad
to show you all the best I have
in my so well appointed store

unless you are, the very poor
I wonder what it is you'll steal
I watch where there is 

no appeal sentence and try you at my ease
don't brush your coat against those please
you scarecrow scaring off the crowds

you shouldnt be on streets allowed

or in the public's right of way
I wish you'd leave the earth today
why dont you

oh just go away
some angel cried
from some bright realm

checking the lists and very well
I do believe while sorting bins
next week and packs of needles and pins

the rarest items for display
this shopkeeper will pass away
and leave his raggedy customer rich

who's still alive though in a ditch.
who has the blue Carolina skies
to watch him with a mild surmise

in his anguished enterprise.

mary angela douglas 15 december 2019

Cherry Top, Lemon Pop

cherry top, lemon pop
what a fizz
oh gee whiz

so delicious
not nutritious
oh but please

cherry cheese
pastry's best
in the West

marshmallow cream
doesn't it seem
candy canes

down the drain
your last cent
where it went

just a kid
lift the lid
take the cake

mischief make
every time
this skipping rhyme

brownie or fudge
dont you judge
God made sweets

and all treats
for us here
do not fear

heaven holds
much more than those.
just be merry

scoop the berries
orange tarts
will make you smart

sugar plum
and butter rum
now I'm done.
yum yum yum.

mary angela douglas 13 december 2019

Surfaces

I saw words, their skaters glazing over
the thin crust of the dead moon broken through
I heard the Big Parade when it was over
the dawns without their overcoats ensued.

the city remade. remade, but in no image
I could discern then we let gumballs fall
from the tree in silver ruin and called it a Christmas

and I said look there is beauty still there is
and stilled because the city will forge its will
against the diamond hardship of the few.

the few for the many. let them pay the price
or the many for the few I can't recall the rule
till everything is spoken out of ice

and the press is silence.

but the citizens are nice.
the citizens are nice
and we are dying.

mary angela douglas 12 december 2019