Even In Words Of Pure Silver

I couldnt explain to myself even in words of pure silver 

their reasons for tilting at ghosts for dredging up lost armies

propping them up in this humidity

and playing war games all over again as  if it were marbles

and this in a time of plague. but hey. haul away.

I couldnt explain to myself with even time honored phrases

the need to refire the past to load the kilns for one more final glaze

on a former  blur of days tragedy bound and the taciturn sweethearts

the ghoulish parades brought back by popular demand

for one more execution.burial in a mass grave

and no permit for memorials. no quarter given

but every quarter taken.

we have come to an age that is bored with itself

that wants to pick fights with the long deceased

that has no imagination left so let's create a new regret

let's play forfeit or chance or scrabble with names and places.

let's dig up the old tubers time forgot

and make potato salad to serve at the ultimate picnic of smug

and then we'll be the founders ourselves.

let's crucify these tears of stone.oh Absalom, Absalom!

and place ourselves upon the Throne.

of Judgement for all those under the sod

oh lets oh lets be God.

mary angela douglas 1 august 2020

For Ray's 100th Birthday Even So

for Ray Bradbury

you wanted so much to live forever (we wanted you to)

that of course living to be 100 would be should be

a piece of cake and you cakewalking through or

a bowl of magnificent ice cream butter pecan a lake

of pink lemonade and cooling shade and fresh spats

enough to hot dog it up even if it wasnt the fourth of July

it was when you got there to any bandstand

gazebo with trailing arbutus there

where is there asked the child stained with grass

everywhere said the blue sky

no one expected the dandelion ceiling to come down

before its time

but there you are vivid among the scuttled chandeliers

the remnant yes the remnant

you are 100 by our reckoning

blow out the candles Ray you know you want to

and make a million wishes on a star in thistledown

it's all around town you could be back

let the firefly swirl begin, the pies cool on the window sill

and you'll eat all your fill in a blueberry wind

our friend, old calliope tune we sure do miss you

we couldnt have planned it this way

that NASA would send up rockets to Mars

all summer long as if to commemorate you

that ladies and gents and kiddos too would have no other way than to

live indoors and read your stories some more

it's not been a bad birthday so far

a little unusual maybe melodramatic

but how could it be otherwise up in your attic

are you typing us into your stories still

can you see the sun from Mars and our housebound picnics

do you hear the whisper of the ghosts of leaves

who danced before you here

can you still see the zinnias

the branches touching each other almost

across the avenues

now voyager soon

in your freshly parceled green mornings

something new for your vu finder there

the earth swimming into blue

and healing 

the earth arrayed again

the Book people gathered

near the infinite rivers of time and language

and the books still live!

and oh, Beautiful Ohio,

Waukegan, all the summer lawns.

remember you.

mary angela douglas 31 july 2020

In The Spilled Cream Of The Day

in the spilled cream of the day

in the picture book of how we felt then

listening to Mary O' Hara sing as delicate

as the harp she played on, the Gaelic songs

I could not understand except by heart

by heart and the jeweled grass singing

in the early dews I remember the shrine

of my childhood, the blue glaze and how I prayed

before I knew that time was less permanent

than the dews

mary angela douglas 31 july 2020

You Will Fail If You Worship Yourselves

reflections on Babel...

you will fail if you worship yourselves

was painted on the walls of the dream cave I explored

dream expedition I dont want to be there anymore

mixing the red clay and the ochre too.

stepping into the view

of the too uncertain veldts.

you will fail if you worship yourselves

and its true on the tundra too

and in the northern woods with the borealis

it's an ancient prophecy in a blank dawn

if you make yourselves the Sun

and the One who made the Sun.you can spell catastrophe

in all the hand dyed colours.

ah look at our tribe what our tribe has done

we will build a tower build a new Sun

better than the old one

everyone will be there

sensing our power we will build extravagantly

more flagrantly

our word the law when history's set to zero hour again.

and so the languages were lost the theme of beauty

walking with God in the cool cool gardens

the sun and the moon

in the eyes of little children drowned.

we worshipped at our own altars

it didnt matter anymore that we werent there

when He made the Stars.

mary angela douglas 31 july 2020

Be Certain To Ask The Doctor All Your Questions While You're There

are our diseases frozen tears

I wondered in the clarity of night

and before dawn

with sleep delayed

and i could not see

I only felt

The Moon.

are our afflictions grief delayed

so unremitted sadness looms and lodges

in the odd cell in the crevice near the heart

in the marrow are there unshed tears and do they harden

crystalizing years on years

does it snow there and will the ice age be prolonged

mary angela douglas 30 july 2020

Rusty Sleep When The Weather Vanes Creak

just to see how the weather vanes blew

I got up from a rusty sleep

I got up and thought about you

whatever  you are 

while skidding, stopping on a dime

or taking the train out just in time

that beat out time with a metronome

and crane your neck toward every throne

on best behavior far from home

of you who wait for the big parades

and can't acknowledge

the fairies in their far corners. well.

here comes a lilac a darling spell

of me not wishing you very well

and the biscuit's hard

and the jelly won't gel

because you live in a way pell mell

and here comes the blind shade up at last

on all that happened in the past

of me not thinking you very kind

there's a scent of skunk wild onions bloom

under the strawberry strawberry moon

and I have skimmed the cream of stars

and know exactly what you are

and need no weather vane to tell

the truth from a lie

at the wishing well.

this copper coin has spent its last

on all that happened in the past.

mary angela douglas 30 july 2020

The River Of Dreams From Grade School On

the river of dreams the story goes

whose river I wonder will it have my clouds from home reflected in it

getting in a dreamy state of mind

rather like Alice I think

though my blue dress doesn't fit anymore

the pale blue the violet sprigged

the river of dreams.

in life I feel too overwhelmed by rivers

though I admire them murky green glass green

blending the recollections of trees with river bottom mud

if I stay too long I sense floods I sense floods of

historical proportions and that I have brought them on

by staying too long

and not beneficence and I am too small for floods.

but the river in books I understand

the river of dreams there

Mark Twain, for instance

The Wind In the Willows

and rivers and terrain as mapped

in schoolbooks with the mountains shown in relief.

it is relief to me that I am not really there

I think to myself at the desk that smells like peanut butter

lost in the mountains with a map key not to scale

stuck in the river's current on a raft and the raft pole drifting away with the day and the day and the day

I prefer the river of dreams watercolours streaming together

after the monsoons of the mind oh indigo

all moods that were in my mood ring once upon a time

the river

that is clouded oh my dreams submerged in opals

the river at dawn

where you can wake

after denouncing the Red Queen

and be safe on the waking shore from rose red retaliations.

and the pursuing soldiers, the whole deck..

mary angela douglas 30 july 2020

1Mary Angela Douglas

The River of Dreams From Grade School On

the river of dreams the story goes

whose river I wonder will it have my clouds from home reflected in it

getting in a dreamy state of mind

rather like Alice I think

though my blue dress doesn't fit anymore

the pale blue the violet sprigged

the river of dreams.

in life I feel too overwhelmed by rivers

though I admire them murky green glass green

blending the recollections of trees with river bottom mud

if I stay too long I sense floods I sense floods of

historical proportions and that I have brought them on

by staying too long

and not beneficence and I am too small for floods.

but the river in books I understand

the river of dreams there

Mark Twain, for instance

The Wind In the Willows

and rivers and terrain as mapped

in schoolbooks with the mountains shown in relief.

it is relief to me that I am not really there

I think to myself at the desk that smells like peanut butter

lost in the mountains with a map key not to scale

stuck in the river's current on a raft and the raft pole drifting away with the day and the day and the day

I prefer the river of dreams watercolours streaming together

after long rains in the mind with

all moods that were in my mood ring once upon a time

the river

that is clouded oh my dreams submerged in opals

where you can wake

after denouncing the Red Queen

and be safe on the waking shore from rose red retaliations.

and the pursuing soldiers, the whole deck..

mary angela douglas 30 july 2020

Chicken Little's Very Bright Day

the bears of three went wandering

and this is what they found

Chicken Little fluttering staring at the ground

they said to him and scratched their chins 

what's wrong with you today

the sky the sky poor Little cried;

was all that he could say.

the bears looked up and they looked down

and nothing did they see

a dust of snow just covering

and barely all the trees.

oh CL you misunderstood

the weather cast last night

and up and down the neighborhoods

you must have caused a fright

for all the people down the street

are glued to their tvs

and sure as sure each one of them

it must be WWIII.

Chicken sighed and he looked shy

to think how much he fussed

the bears said hey it's not that bad

come home with us for brunch..

and have some berries in a bowl

and porridge on the side.

and take a nap on Ma's green couch

and cast your fears aside.

so chicken little started out

and then was glad to see

a cottage dear all in the clear

and places set for three.\

then piped up little baby bear

Ill do my one good deed

and let you have my baby stool

cuz you're a lot like me.

then they all laughed

the day turned gold

the page was turning too

and now the story's done my child

and all your worries too

keep this in mind and just be kind

and you will stick around

and tell yourself no matter what

the sky can't fall to ground.

mary angela douglas july 29 2020

These Are The American Sonatas

"these are the american sonatas"

I heard in a dream, in a voice stentorian.

and a sky of glass shattered

shattered an april wind.

and beauty was slaughtered all over again

let the player piano roll

be broken down to a code

where all the parties we used to have

to celebrate small joys have foundered.

and are under investigation.

where is the music for this I asked my God

that inner visions have been hijacked.

that all speech has become slogans.

weep o muse of America

weep oh falling glass and the splintered birds

alas you pioneering angels

you saints of the rough terrain

surely there may  be a mountain pass

as yet undiscovered

where we can recover

the dream of who we are the covenant

and sift the gold dust anew

and find the trail

with You.

oh God my God.

far from the spoilers.

mary angela douglas 28 july 2020

Anyone Writing Now In The World (A Letter Across Time)

anyone writing now in the world

famous or not I want to say to you

please dont let them reduce your work to one required theme

you know what I mean or

to any theme at all. its your bread.

you have the right to butter it the way you want.

to put jam on it or not.

to drip the honey of time on it deep amber drop by drop.

dont let them quell you.cast a spell on you so that you are down

to one word only and chirp woodenly like a broken bird

politics politics politics

what do we need with a trillion more books on one harping theme

commanded as if by unappoinited infantry.

we dont live in politics.

we live in our souls.

in kingdoms within.

in our imaginations.

escaping to other realms

when the world is harsh.

it has always been this way

until the new lawgivers came

their mouths permanently grim

and reduced us all to the same drab pattern.

approved by Them.

resist this.

write in gold. in the sky with blue streamers.

penning the secret lives of trees.

mary angela douglas 26 july 2020

Little Children Storybook Dressed

little children minding the Father's cloud sheep
in the old storybook I was read to from then.
how happy I was to gaze at you there

safe from harm. or in Sunday school
in Jesus arms.

little children. I was little too.
and now I'm not.
though I still look at clouds

and think of you
and remember applesauce with cream.
and Christmas.

the meadow cows in books

the singing brooks.
Yeats said it best when he said "come away...with a fairy hand in hand:
the world's more feel of weeping than you can understand"

stay in the storybook stay. Where there are only gentle winds.
out here I pray for you where sometimes it seems
as it has seemed to me

the rest is wilderness.

mary angela douglas 26 july 2020

You Will Be The Violet Shod

you will be the violet shod oh with a nod and you'll
go dancing on o
you will be the garlanded the heralded

the lilac sprigged and you'll go dancing on

you will be the rose bright maids the gentle brave
in light and shade
summers lemon skied parade

while you go dancing on o.

prophecies may come and go
all I know in drifts of snow
still I can see with brimming eyes

that you'll survive, and so alive
as you go dancing on o.

mary angela douglas 25 july 2020

To Sharon From Other Summers

bring back summer in a hatful of strawberries
dusty feet on a dust curled road near Lake Maumelle
warm cokes out of the machine

in the fish bait store.
we will twirl again our hula hoops of blue and green
make ourselves dizzy on the carousel

slurping snow cones at the zoo
where the baby elephant adores our peanuts.
or later at the Saturday matinees with popcorn money

dream we are Pollyana.
we'll splash in our plastic swimming pool

and zip right down the slip n slide
and come inside when Grandmother says
mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the noonday sun.

we'll have so much fun remembering how it felt
to read whatever you wanted without any book report
to feel the summer like an ocean of time

that stretched before you every time on our blue bikes
when every day was an excuse for some kind of ice cream.
and Christmas seemed so far away

and you played Gershwin every day or Mozart or Scarlatti
or whatever you pleased while I barely dusted
the ivory keys absorbed in Jane Eyre

and Grandmother gave us music theory lessons or
brought back Spanish and French flash cards
in her impromptu manner, along with the eclairs.

while Grandfather said enthusiastically
re the Olivetti he carried back
from his office

girls this is the summer you learn to type

and we did, coming to the aid of our country.

mary angela douglas 25 july 2020

For Those With Difficulty Walking

we'll walk on clouds as into a peach horizon
or in the conservatory of Orion
leaving our fingerprints there on each facet

of the diamond stars or tread with angels
the fields of Mars and carry rose bright sunrise
as a bouquet

I know you will say to me but when;
I only know walking on earth is hard
when there are mines and when your foot

declines to answer the call of your mind
carry me over rough stone dear God
I am blinded by tears

carry me over the thresjomg uears
and set me down new winged
like mercury mercury's child

with a message made of silver:

Eternity, in a little while.

mary angela douglas 25 july 2020

To The Nightingale Reviled

they have banished you sweet nightingale o
fabled nightingale from the modern poems
the post modern too the post post modern.

I will make a nest for you even in the smallest of my poems
the most miniature where you can feel
everything leafy and green around you

and the moistening dew. unfettered singing.
how you will fluff up your wings little nightingale.
how you will pour forth song.

in honor of Keats and the mulberry tree.
of all the beauty that came to be in the far ages of poetry
they are renouncing now.

how I remember Hans Andersen and how in his tale
you drove back death in a white garden
so that an Emperor lived. 

all that golden lore. i will forgive them for your sake.
I will make a garden for you
I will wait for you.

mary angela douglas 25 july 2020

Men Who Have Died In Battle

(reflecting on the removal of Confederate statues)

men who have died in battle
who have died for the worst of causes
called up persuaded that they were only

defending home ah God should they be pitied?
or should their effigies in stone be pulled up by the roots
hurled over the clinical balconies of the world.

where is pity then. where is pathos. mercy
that even their marble angels are gone.
so that they wander in sodden fields half ghostly

missing home.

so that what they felt in the last agonies
has no credence. or those who mourned for them.
it is expedient it seems

to kill them again.to rename the empty space.
to take away even their memory from earth.
to allow no unsanctioned tears

after all these years!
to have no pity that flowers grow out of the sockets of their eyes

still in some mass grave unrecognized
or blown to bits.
but righteousness in a narrow age

demands this.
that they must be slaughtered again.

mary angela douglas 23 july 2020

Daphne In The Rustling Serene

the myth is one of many
expressing the need for escape
for sudden harbor.

as in the children's fairytales
when the children pursued
turn themselves into a lake

a bridge
the mirrored skies.
Daphne crystal clear

in her musings chose
the tree to vanish into
so she grew bark

and branches, leaves in the instant
and golden twigs
in the early the perilous Spring

and foiled the Enemy. rustling serene.
and under her boughs as well and the kind winds filtering through
beleaguered children sought refuge too

as with surmising angels.

mary angela douglas 22 july 2020

Prologue: The Garden Of Statues

who will reap this harvest of stone
and the sickle bending near
who will reap these stone tears

and be commended by angels.
long years they have stood
beneath the guardian trees

or under the blazing in humid summer squares.

frozen in misalliance misled valor chaos.
the last trace
of all that slaughter.

and the bodies unrecovered.

stumbling toward death
thinking only of home.

the blood lines cut from earth.
and no grave.
will you cut them more?

where is mercy
why is mercy now snowed under.
when the dust was laid comingled at Gettysburg

by Lincoln have you forgotten charitable words

will you come at midnight for him too?
a neo assasination in stone.how modern.
will you drag him down to the river.

because he was merciful to the foe?

who lived by the mercy of Christ
withold the angels cry from heaven
withold

where God has not reaped
how will men sow.

mary angela douglas 21 july 2020

To The Golden Age And To The King Of Heaven

I was saved by the Golden Age.
by the notion of it in the notions counter of Heaven
and as it was recorded over long centuries. millenia

sinking under an emerald sea. we cry to loveliness
come back!

what was it we couldnt remember that stirred in a dawn wind.
we couldnt remember but a faraway gleam
of something that seemed so paradisical

and green.
something we once knew.
and each child knows knows with maypole ribbons fluttering

knew from the beginning and finds it sometimes in play
on the afternoon of something who can say what
a light appears in the sky like a birthday

from an unexpected source. and it rains down opals.
meteor showers in the daytime
or suddenly pink flowers small in the grass arrive overnight

express delivery from Whom?

and you stop to ask as you stoop down
oh who made you this beautiful.
I was saved by the golden age

by its name in every language on earth
by stories that accumulated from birth, by the old hymns
and all of the merry carols carillon ringing

by infinite regions singing about the house

the midnight angels heralding

and suddenly you feel you are on a stage

where the curtains will rise the moon and the stars with them
and nothing bad will ever happen again.

mary angela douglas 21 july 2020

Let The Time Be Jeweled

o let the time be jeweled
and the music box never wind down
the waltz be pale blue

matching the slippers.
let the time be jeweled
and the green trees rustling

I will remember gardenias in May and the whole summer
remember standing poised before
a doorway of pearl.

let the leaves dance after long rains
and then be sparkling .as we walked out.
let God go by coinciding with rainbows

with the footfall of gleam and the looking glass returned.
that time may stand still.
that the soul may blossom again

after grim hardship
let the story be wrapped in gold
and may it be wept for joy

may it be wept for joy
with the children all coming Home
the wayfayer and the set upon
with the music box never winding down.

that eternity may blossom all velvet leaved,
and lined with cloud:
a dusk red rose.

mary angela douglas 21 july 2020

I Love Random Unzoned Birdsong

I love random unzoned birdsong
and clouds without steering committees
that suddenly turn bright orange

and make the children long for popsicles.
I love purple wildflowers popping through  the cracks
in  the unfixed sidewalks and I pray, almost every day,

please let them stay that way.and tangles of honeysuckle vine
along the fences lining the highways.
I love the unplanned city.. may it forever escape detection.
or sides of the road where the mower hasnt been

where toadstools frolic after the rains when the elves are silent
in giant polka dots and where butterflies
with emerald spots
have no campaigns and so they

never take the air lane from a to z. when it's more fun fluttering.

maybe it's just me but I cant grouse at all about the things
that are groused about now. I find delight is proliferating.
all over town.

leave things alone. I feel happy this way. despite

what you may say at the council meetings.

let wild onion sprout, occasional squirrels
and how the wind comes up out of nowhere
and the thunderheads

needing no permits is something I could break into song over.
I love the clover. let it be a kingdom.
I love the buttercup slips the way that starlight falls
into the alcoves

of the far woods you all forgot to inspect;the tumbledown house.
and though I press rose petals between the pages of books
and wear unusual shoes with my dress

I confess blithely what? am I running for office?

I treasure all alive and brilliant perfuming the air
and charging no one a fee all the blossoming
and I wish that I could roses be and pay no rent.

but that's just me. how Heaven sent me.

mary angela douglas 20 july 2020

Cause

the beauty of the story as originally told
somehow surely I swore to uphold as a little girl
whenever I closed my eyes shut tight with the birthday candle wish

it must have been this
to let the domain of fairy tale remain the same
in all its lore its gold spilling out

onto the floor of the nursery where I am read to
all about Red Riding Hood or that Queen Victoria said:
I will be good, at 18 when suddenly she was queen

I thought I will be good too and a measure of that
a goodly measure 
is standing up for the truth of all that's beautiful
and that was before.

and still I hoist my flag above the magic of it all
shadow and light together the trials of the heart
and goodness rewarded after the bitterness dissolves.

that is my cause.
to keep those realms intact.
the golden coach on the road

the crystal slipper
safe from shattering.

mary angela douglas 20 july 2020

Clare In Heaven

clare in Heaven sought to know
would Francis remember her somehow
as the girl she was now again

facing the road of pearl.
would she know him
and would he have become

himself the canticle of the sun
she cried.
for what they had won.

and because Assisi seemed seemed so long ago
when vows were young as though it were always Spring
and for this reason too that they were recovered now

each from their separate way. 
each now, coming home.
with aureoles of gold

and far from the long exile.
the music of this is not written but sung.

mary angela douglas 18 july 2020

Escorial

(for Professor Anthony J. Cervone)

last night I dreamed of the Escorial
of the painting of saints with angular faces
Toledo in grey and the storms gathering

la vida es sueno or it may have been and the siglo del oro
the siglo del oro the infanta with roses in a square of light
and skies glisten dark plum overnight

and I am singing a vagrant's tune

Garcia Lorca,kaleidoscope moon

moon of the verdant green
moon of the everlastingly verdant green
over the sobbing balconies.

I'm in the book of the small blue flowers;

how shall I play my pavane for you for the hour is late.
the pavane for you and the piano locked. 
the bell tower's weathering of storms grows pale

too hard to believe. or to contemplate

a children's lullaby etched in silver.
a paper bird before the war.
a paper bird singing with brilliant plumage

a bird that cannot sing anymore.

the stage sets you adored in miniature thrashed.
the sky as pink as the Alhambra at last
all of Andalusia gleams the rust of autumn

and life as a dream of a dream in a dream is past:
tiene que ser de esta moda
a caged music flying into the gold

into the gold of the siglo del oro
Cervantes at the scarred windowpane.
laughing at the thought of fame.

the matador's cape is lined in flame,

Segovia. the music of amber.

flamenco barters by the hour.
while I am in a high high tower
with clouds and angels beckoning.

I want to go back to the Escorial.
to the way that I felt then from only the pictures in books.
the oranges composed in a bowl of blue

and that was the whole summer I learned Spanish
the way that I wanted to.
the soul of it the subtle shadings.

as if the kings were looking for you.
all the hidden Magi.
were looking for you for costly,
for lost lost time..

in the preterit of dreams.

mary angela douglas 18 july 2020