Shostakovich: Preludes And Fugues

I dreamed I fell into the river of music

it was moss green and very swift and then it was slow

there were ice floes the river was almost frozen

it was the preludes of Shostakovich and I must have 

been there a long time in the unwinding of the fugues

as if I had forgotten myself entirely, where I came from

what language I spoke who knew me

I found that I could float looking upwards at Orion

but the music was sombre

it became an ocean and then a lake or the mist of one

the mist was moss green and then from other planets

or a planet in between

I could no longer float but only drift

the stars were completely in the music

they could not depart

the heart was in the music

the depths the sombre quality was impossible

to leave

and the gnarled trees

that I had seen before

in some other country

incompetent to translate

mary angela douglas 1 february 2021

An Early Valentine To My Mama, My Grandmother, And Great Grandmother In Heaven

whatever pink cloud you are perhaps on at times viewing my longitude

and latitude perched in Heaven I wish I could send you a trial

balloon escaped from Court

haha, or a vintage valentine or two that would come to life you know

like the doves in Cinderella holding looped and pale blue sateen

ribbon in their beaks all curlicued (the ribbon, not their beaks);I

know you would laugh at that)

and a picture hat loaded down with pink irrepressible roses.

posies Grandmother will say correcting me in a new fashioned way

that still feels perrenially old fashioned but I'm not here to say

anything cloying its just

I would like to see you both for the day, great grqndmother too

and whisper a childish blandishment or two and write in your albums

in sepia ink

I think I  think therefore I dance because you taught me to

even on the rough waves when no one comes to save the mermaid from

turning to foam on the jade green sea.

which was, anyway, what she wanted to be

to show her undying Love.

mary angela douglas 30 january 2021

Dirge Of The Last Thing Seen

to those who slipped on the hammered gold of the moon

the moon's reflection, who never told anyone

where they were going who one moment were here

and the next instant disappeared I am writing this

in a cursive of silver with a golden edge

to those who slipped from the ledge leaning back too far

may they have a diamond compass in heaven

to see the beautiful,  the evening star

stepping into the clouds I weep this not aloud

I only stoop and pray on the hard exacting earth

as if on a promontory of tears

to say ever has it been this way

for those who dream too far leaning out of the window

in the crosscurrents of air

not measuring where they are to see the last thing

jagged as lightning in the midnight skies

they ever saw on earth.

mary angela douglas 30 january 2021

If Poetry Loses This Transcendent Moment

if Poetry loses this transcendent moment

the dewdrop trembling at the edge of the leaf

about to plunge into a small yet infinite space 

where the child eye is gleaming

where green grass is born again

where the wind picks up and we feel for the instant

we could fly we could be turned upside down

and spiral through stars if poetry loses that

and labels itself in jars as useful to the State all over again

to the big political nothing again where will we weep

that the Lord will hear us or in the flutter of crimson leaves

exult

what mystery will we keep beyond the keepers of the files

I will not defile the transcendent moment

I will remember the long blizzards of poetry

the ice thawed rushing in the Spring

the heartbreak the tremor in everything

I will not agree to eclipse the sun

I will not deny it is God through everything 

filtered in His own rainbow hues as His promise to you

and the images of

the crystal bells hung at the windows of fate

I listened to, long ago in my first being I promise

that I will remember, that I will not forget

that I will transcribe 

this evanescence this beauty

the best I can

and the music of it rattling through

oblivious to everything

everything on the news.

mary angela douglas 30 january 2021

The Way Things Should Be

the leaf and the shadow of the leaf in agreement

the white birches made more silver in moonlight

the snow more dazzling at dawn

the violets I came upon in a dream prolonged

the footprints smoothed over so that there is only snow

there is only purity of intent in the petals falling over the earth

and the Rood of jeweled light rising

and the swan of music endlessly in flight

the story with its happy ending

the Rose that Eternity invents

and  the lullaby

where we drift on a green seam in a wooden boat

and only know in the waves lapping against the boat

that just keeps floating on

that God is love is love is love.

mary angela douglas 29 january 2021

To See Yourself In The Purpling Waters

(for Hans Christian Andersen)

all the sad duckling things you went through

learning to emerge a swan.

see, I will make for you an azure stillness

that you may recognize why you have come

to see yourself in the purpling waters

to see yourself as the only one

with the key to this particular kingdom.

unlocking it, for everyone.

stories will come, circling like Swans

above Denmark, Denmark in a different phase

and Love a strange love will resign itself

to sinking below the waves

only to rise on the next page

in a tin soldier mustering a gun

we are waiting for the winds to divide us

he says to no one

to see yourself in the purpling of the waters

with these frail reasons you have come

the storyteller of love itself unrequited by anyone

refurbished in the oddities of the world

in the mirroring waters as the sun descends

your shadow stories rising and falling

may we begin again?

to crest the wave and then to disappear

to love in so distant a way beyond the years

silhouettes on the screen of the beautiful

past the sad duckling days

swans on the infinite waters

learning to sing His Praise.

mary angela douglas 27 january 2021

After The Ballet Blanc

I remember the snow ballets, ballet blanc preeminent

all graciousness and grace when the least gesture

under the stage set moon could call forth meteors

in bloom and the roseate:

all that impearled and imperial choreography; the after life of Light

and I would be entranced,

certain of enchantment as if it were a right; terra firma at last

that fairyland of old

at the ballet dressed in its pink and gold, costumed

in all the flower pastels and glittering

and with my own programme notes in view

dreaming within the paraphrases of dream.at least for those suspended hours.

each rose, rapt scene. the clouds that towered.

now they have taken the better part of the heart

and technicality reigns and what difference does

all that tulle make. that prescient lighting when you dont convey

the stories anymore, the graciousness and the grace, the glimmering sitings

but only dazzle so that you will be seen

above the peril of everything

oh lost tragedians! through what steps have you been led

through what realms of the living and the dead

your coded language they no longer know

and on the imperiled wavering stage

it no longer snows and the heart is lead nor are we anymore

the Blessed,

on honeydew fed.

mary angela douglas 26 january 2021;22 march 2021

For Everything

I loved You for the bracing winds

for all the stories that never end

for the star flung borderlands and then

for the bread and butter of the every day.

I loved you too in early dawns

the pearl sheened ones

curling into faint pinks

while washing dishes at the sink with the little window

glimpsing them through the tilted blinds.

I loved you more

in the golden ore I could sift in school ruled and unruled

and in the griefs that passed into the infinite,

green gold buddings of the Springs

for every note you let me sing

I loved you God, for everything.

mary angela douglas 26 january 2021

The Radiance Of All Things

THE RADIANCE OF ALL THINGS

(to the poet, William Blake)

why do you listen to the minor prophets

when you could listen to the King

I heard my guardian angel sing

and sigh, 

over the field of fruitless enterprise.

then I saw rise again or at least His topaz shadow,

tyger ringed,

Christ in his full maned glory while we wept

flinging over us imperishably

the radiance of all things.

mary angela douglas 26 january 2021

Strawberry Cakes And Unexpired

we'll pass strawberry cakes to all the dolls

with no expiration dates, the cakes I mean

with raspberry tea, the rest will be for you and me.

we'll mind all manners.

the whole summer through on rainy days watching the

blousy trees full out with green on a grey scene window framed

but happy inside playing the least board game or that the bride doll

for the ten thousandth time has thrown her bouquet

she never tires of all her wedding attire.

and the paper flowers hold up.

we will too through other summers come due,

a little less pleasant.

but life is a present my Grandmther seemed to say

open it open it 

don't leave it for another day.

and so we did. let the magic stay

all booked up in the Land of Play.

mary angela douglas 24 january 2021

To Wake Up From This Poem-Dream

the dollhouse in my poem has isinglass windows.

I dont know what isinglass is. I just like the sound of it.

it sounds like winter, glazed over. or like a thin layer of crystal

over a panoramic Easter Egg, sugar egg and by design

inside I can see the tiny girl near the one rosebush

she is holding one pink rose

as though on the planet of St. Exupery

I will go in my poem to the museum of music boxes

that all still work. I will find the keys and wind them all at once so that all the tinny sweet songs are melting in the air together;

the fairies and their carillions!

then I will go through the side door into a courtyard

where everything is blooming at once

only in miniature;while I with my small watering can

water the gardens of Monet...the lilies of Rheims.

I like Alice will have to eat the side of the biscuit that makes you taller

or promise God ten thousand fanciful things

or say the word roseate endlessly

or turn myself into firefly gleams

to wake up from this poem-dream.

mary angela douglas 24 january 2021

Lovers Of Stars For Their Own Sake, Equations...

lovers of stars for their own sake, equations

distances to the suns how numerous you are and beautiful

you secret astronomers, backyard gazers at the Moon

amateurs. lovers of things for their own sake

and not the progress you can make

what music you have made even without the aid of investing angels

on your own, seeking no renown at all

extoling then...the clouds, collecting only their names

needing no worldwide fame

surely  there is a Heaven just for you

who paid the rose its due and the Maker too

you shall be wreathed with flowers

at rest in a golden dower

who loved the quenching rains

the vastness of the plains

who wept in joy just to be born

in time to see the sunset over the strivers

who pushed you all around

to get the best view in town.

mary angela douglas 24 january 2021 

Not An Ode To The Keepers Of The Gate

they bolt the door

and circle the wagons thrice over

all this they say to keep the wolves at bay

and boy, do they speak in code

in every single ode the same refrain

we've got a we've got a world to gain

an ever churning train on the tracks

to keep the gifted back

but Im in a dubious mode and I know better.

I know it isnt the wolves out here disconsolate

in any kind of weather

under the moonlight and freezing.their golden fleece off

the poets of light are being squeezed out or never

invited in to the raging pen at all

of the coterie the coterie with their light refreshments

their need to gain it all and win and win and win

and I wonder how their angels sleep at night, the squeezers

the panel of judges pleasers cause they're all friends or at least

a  curious cadre bent on gaining the whole territory

the keepers of the gates ready at any instant to defend

not even debate

the part of the turf they happened to win oh way back when

what's that hammering I think too restless in my sleep

to bear it anymore:

the forging of crowns and crowns on crowns 

a voice neither here nor there lets me know

they still have much more building to go

and Babel has never looked queasier.

mary angela douglas 24 january 2021

On Consdering the Lifeline Of The Rose

we thought about the lifeline of the rose, of the roses on the rose bushes

and their petals scattered in the flower beds, my sister and I when we were little girls

and we wept then for the roses. for the petals and moved them closer one by one to

the bushes they had drifted from so they would feel less alone there on the ground.

how evanescent rainbow bubble like at times our childhood feelings were.

I think now too of the lifeline of the rose and it is us now perhaps who feel as we

imagined the roses felt back then in my grandparents backyard

how we would like to stay.

and blossom there, here on earth forever.

forever rosy, bud to bloom in a single hour it seems to have all  transpired.

and I weep now as we did then that soon the rose winds may

find us for

the hours are shorter now, it isn't so far;

one day, mere petals, we'll let go

and learn to bloom again

among the stars.

mary angela douglas 23 january 2021

The Fairy Door

I wish I had a lock and key

for the fairy door in the old oak tree

that I discerned one winter day

while walking home in a fairy play

but mine was the role to just pass by

the fairy domicile under snow skies

and wish and wish I could always be

the passerby of such mystery

and use one rose petal for a scarf

and catch a glimpse of the fairy hearth

and write a triolet or two

for stepping out in the evening dew

lost in the violets under the dell

casting spells on the wishing well

so that those who came and those who went

would stop counting the tears

that they had spent

on wishing the whole world far away

on a day forlorn in a song so fey

Oh heck, I'll do  it anyway

though Im too grown they say they say

I wish you happy and bright of face

every one in the human race

and full past sunset,

all of God's grace..

mary angela douglas 23 january 2021

Notes On Gliding

as if the sky were a lilac corsage you fastened to the diminishing 

night

with the scant and lingering moon

I have seen dawn that way

and birds glide silent as snow on the upturned wind

I have seen the sails coming in at morning

masts of the dream clouds, the rains like beaded curtains shift

over a prismed field.

I will see again though I have aged

spelling it with my eyes closed yes, the vagrant wind

the gipsy wind from the childhood poems my Grandmother

gave me and know that You have made the soul so free

as to glide effortlessly

even while,

imprisoned here.

oh Beautiful sagacity.

mary angela douglas 23 january 2021

Can I Just Say No One Is GoingTo Hell For This

for not knowing how to make pimento cheese from scratch

for not keeping house the way you do

for wearing white after Labor Day

for wearing too much makeup

for not wearing enough makeup

for having their nose in a book

for never having their nose in a book

for watching tv after work

for doing handstands at inappropriate moments

for wearing horizontal stripes when they are chubby

for having a cluttered house

for having no house at all

for sitting alone in the school cafeteria

for calling in sick

for sitting down a moment to rest

for being sad

for being happy

for being sad and happy at the same time

for speaking in a childlike way

for being quiet in social situations

for not wearing a hat

for wearing a hat

for all the things you can think ot to turn up your nose at a person for

but you who are the ones making the unwritten rules count against

whoever you want to gossip about

you had better dress for summer

on your last day on earth.

it might get toasty.

mary angela douglas 22 january 2021

Lost In The Sea Of Your Attributes

lost in the sea of your attributes as they composed them,

the Scholastics, I push the books away

and think of the very day the very light of Very Light

the eternal Present I feel without reading another word

The Word lodged like a dove in my heart

I would fling it out into the open air

leaving all words behind in some new greening of the earth

for the Love that's guilding everything right now in the illuminating air

beyond beyond all categories and most, beyond despair.

mary angela douglas 22 january 2021

Holding Onto Zero

sometimes you wake in the middle of the night, the day, the dream

and find you are holding onto nothing

flagstaff without a flag, less than a ghost, less then a point on a graph

a negative number canceled off the earth

sometimes

you grasp the sleeve of the scarecrow thinking to detain 

somehow the realization coming through the radio silence

a sudden nova and news alert oh yes there is nothing

to see here folks, move on.

stop mourning for zero.

zero will accomodate itself

in freezing weather

with no hint of Spring.

mary angela douglas 21 january 2021

Beautiful Speaking, Arise

beautiful speaking passes into the grave

so we have thought on earth except for what was saved

or memorized by heart, cordoned off in libraries

reverenced in old age by those with the memory of the

veins in the leaves of human speech.

oh out of reach and that for a long, long time

beautiful speaking is in decline and even the records of it

unenshrined

curled around the edges, sold off by lot.

all language has become polemical, inimical

fit for rage fit for those who are cyber aware

fit for the sunset of the Age.

what will language be then if the trend continue

Christ rose again may beautiful speaking rise with Him

rise with Him

in the language birds make through the air cleaving the air in two

on an emerald wave with the feelings retained and cherished and the

foreknowledge

of how to glide to turn the word to song

world without end children may sense in their apricot dreams

no matter what faux poets pretend, aspire to

or those who would have us mute or prone to slogans and thus

far easier to command.

mary angela douglas 18 january 2021

The Philosophers And I Cannot Agree

they plough through forests of words and don't look back

relentlessly and the works banked up appear almost as snow

if only they were that alive and the wolfish words follow them

they are on the track the circular, ocular trails that lead them back now

to mountains of words when will it be enough and I want to say

though I dont know their language Lord God. in the stillness

where the stars are achingly silver 

I just want to see the flower called snowdrop holding one thawed

drop of rain. You don't have to explain anything to me.

mary angela douglas 18 january 2021

Watching The Old Movies In Your Mind

the characters seem familiar

set in an ancient light

their manners are formal

hidden, their delight

the memory is stirred

like silt when the river floods

it is the river it was the river

of all the childhood loves you packed away

on many and many a moving day

the characters shift; the scenery foams

the kaleidoscope alters on its own

when you no longer

can write a letter home

home, cast in an ancient light

has formal manners now

and has become the high sign of Art

a garden you water of the departed

archetypes of the heart

the characters young or old

once vivid in their presence

who have let go of earth for quite some time now

with ever and anon that semiprecious gleam

to take up a wavering residence

in your dream

mary angela douglas 17 january 2021

Listening for Rilke, Midwinter

stop. it's January. you can feel the water slow and turn to ice

even overnight in a pond on the other side of the world.

or know that the rushes froze where no one ever goes

only birds in a respite from no freelanced winter flight.

this is listening then to be this still that you are attuned to

things far distant. as if you were Rilke at the end of

a gold spun tunnel of light.the poet writing, up all night

on the battlements of Time and wonder.

and felt the violin's span

as if it were your heart that bled through music

murmuring to forgotten things.

to wings poised in mid air

on  the bluest the incarnational wind

that closes the eyes of the flowers,

and then, your own.

mary angela douglas 15 january 2021

The Language Of Clouds And Other Trinkets

to some He gave the language of clouds

high banked and violet;effulgent rose at the End

to some He gave the wind for a friend

barreling through and fern green as all beginnings

to others very far the bright and evening star

the wish to be invisible granted.

the echo of Christmas chimes in summer

reading the classics undercover.

various gifts the angels received

but to us, to us children of rust and dreams,

He deeded everything.

mary angela douglas 15 january 2021

Telling Time By The Flowers

then we could tell time by the flowers

by orange extravagances of the day lilies

or watching our shadows lengthen on the pavements

as if we had shaded them in with the red violet crayon

beside the small pink border flowers either side of the sidewalk.

or time was the heartbeat of the metronome while

outside in a different cadence the wind whispered to us

through the pines you are a child you will always be a child

playing these scales

flowing in this green moment...

let me fasten again my hair with the crystal butterfly

or use the porcelain mirror with the roses on it

and feel elegant for awhile before the world turns over

tumping out,as we used to say all its coloured ribbons 

on the moss floors., the less than level ground.

for the moment we have oceans of time.

so much time we could swim through it forever

grow a silver fin;be mermaids once again

and live in the watercolour our faces arrange

in the rain, over the roses.

mary angela douglas 14 january 2021

No One Is Going Away

in Heaven no one is going away.

no suitcases packed.no luggage racks.

no lace handkerchiefs waved at the station

no passengers sorrowful, fearful at looking back

lest the weeping never stop

sunset and sunrises coinciding

in the same golden drop 

the roses, picked and placed in a vase

will never fade nor the sheep in intense green meadows

ever ever stray. fresh strawberries every day!

and in the looking glass you fear no more to gaze.

in Heaven no one is going away

not even the clouds 

not the young grass nor April's green

nor all that we had heard or seen which we relive again

sweetly world without end nostalgia becomes a fixed point

the heart has all its loves forever

and of all things one could say about the after life

how can there be anything more to be said than that

after you're dead and arrayed in celestial form

no one is going away from you.

ever. anymore.

mary angela douglas 12 january 2021

He Who Is Without Change

ice turns to water 

water to ice

water to steam when kettles dream;

is it a dream that clouds become rain

grass goes to seed.

colors to fade

when all that we need

when the wells run dry

is to know that You love us

and never could lie.

mary angela douglas 11 january 2021

Because I Knew That Beauty Should Reign

(for Sara Teasdale, all her songs remembered)

because I knew that beauty should reign

I have tried again and again

to thread my needle with the quasered light

of even one star

and walked through all uncertainty

to find the stillness You decreed

the linnet breaching the linen skies.

all things hidden, in disguise

through mendacious enterprise

suddenly revealed to me the endless dreaming

of the white orchards of cloud strewn moonlight.

now in the twilight of poetry perhaps the children

have forgotten me

but beauty survives.

mary angela douglas 11 january 2021

Blind Like Lear

it is in fact true according to what they are now calling the best sciencewe have by this part of the story fallen through many cracks if not fissures

so that we say to you Lord God bring back the golden hour the rose to the crevasse

we are lost in the war of words hurt by the stake of words used cruelly

against us who only wanted to wander happy sheep among your green hills

and it isnt that I want to make such jeweled amendments to the fairy tales so that they are overladen

but everything is so plain now, so stark is this darkness and the murk that lies over the kingdom.

where is the secret lock to the secret door into that golden world we so often feel

is just beyond our reach. teach me to dream again, my Saviour and my friend

lest rude ghosts break the ties that bind.

and we wander blind like Lear among the broken stones.

mary angela douglas 10 january 2021

What Is Important

what is important to remember on the purple Flood

when your small Ark may be sundered 

it seems, at any given moment

is that He spoke Light and there was Light

Tree and there was Tree. Stars and all Infinity.

what is important when the waves have dashed against your

heart without mercy, and relentlessly

is that Light the very same that He had named

abides in you and cannot be destroyed.

mary angela douglas 8 january 2021

mary angela douglas 8 january 2021

Snow Train

what time's the snow train coming in

I wonder sometimes when I hear the forecast

or look beyond the panes at the clouds edged in silver violet

or momentary cream.

was it a dream the school children dreamed

something icy to snarl the traffic or to make raspberry shrub from

something nostalgic so that suddenly I sense

the scents of Christmas cinnamon, oranges and cloves

and cannot tear myself from the view

of the snow train coming in perhaps,

the coming snowy view.

mary angela douglas 8 january 2021;22 march 2021

When You Remember

there are dreamlike moments when the unthinkable happens

time is paused and the glass slipper slips from her hands

who could guess prisms could compound such a shattering so

that there seems to be no blue bird near at hand.

you remember the summer marigold or was it the moon

turned marigold and we sipped apricot nectar, chilled.

practicing all afternoons the piano scales.

time is not paused except in the music, when you play it over

when you reconsider the sound was everywhere.

it fell softly like

snow, composing you.

mary angela douglas 8 january 2020

Cornbread

 maybe we will remember one day far from all this

how we lived on golden cornbread crumbs in a manner of speaking

and oh how you multiplied them without our even asking

so that each crumb became a loaf. each loaf an entire bakery.

who are you Lord God that from such small quantities can make a feast

so that all weeping turns overnight to flowers

so that we gather in an explicable harvest

a plenitude of stars.

A Thief Came Stealing The Roses Out Of My Poems

 A THIEF CAME STEALING THE ROSES OUT OF MY POEMS

a thief came stealing the roses out of my poems.

the moss from under my footfall.

to whom should I complain.

I know my roses will grow again.

the green gold moss by the violets I saw

in the early grades.

I wonder if there were witnesses.

when he skimmed the cream of moonlight

the unusual way it struck my retina and

if I write about the stars next

will men then look up and praise the starlight

that was there:

plucked out of ex nihilo by the One

who asked me to write certain things down

in the first place; about roses, moss and the undercoating

of snow

by the one who originally spoke in florid bright illuminating grace

Let Light Be. let there be floods

I will not drown. let there be floods of thieves

I will not grieve

at least I know

false poets come and go

true beauty praises the Original.

mary angela douglas 2 january 2021

1Mary Angela Douglas

I Used To Write Poems To You For The Constellations

I used to write poems to You for the constellations

and speak to You through the Psalms in shades of blue and green

and thank you profusely for making the skies turn cranberry

in drear and drizzling January.

I have lost count of all the things that have made my heart glad.

And certainly I know I am not your only child.

such as I am I thank you Lord God for every breath.

for all the sunsets I have left.

and for the myriad things so numerous, winged and lovely

(the music I have heard)

I cannot put them into words.

mary angela douglas 2 january 2020

The End Of The Measure

can anything here ever start again I asked the leaves in a withering 

wind or I hold with God my end of the bargain

perhaps you thought of this at the end of the measure

the measure in a dream and the metronome done

the music in a drawer incapable of being translated.

will I ever feel the fresh air on my face as I did then

in this place or when the shadows are plum coloured

the bird in the fairy tale primed to sing and signal to us that

beauty has come like a ghost into the old gardens

shall I observe the apricot moon

or shall I drift till noon

shall I drift the rest of mortal life away

on the chance that suddenly in a half dream

the light of one most singular star

through clouds of violet and through the heavy mists

will turn the pavements into amethyst.

mary angela douglas 2 january 2021

Time And Motion And The Angels In Flight

time and motion and the angels in flight

the sudden epiphanies the morning light

the cost of living and the cost of dreams

summed up riddled on the silver screen

how we lived then without a hitch

the popcorn aromas and the Disney flicks

at the matinees some Saturdays...

the school day maples and the dog does tricks

nudging us with her nose

and secretly prays for the fried chicken crumbs of it

of all that dinner radiance

the happy landings because we are always clumsily

dropping our food there on the linoleum under the kitchen

table what we wouldn't give to relive if we could

even being extra good for Christmas

any of those antique scenes

the escritoire of aqua green

the scent of rain through the back door screen

fountain pens and deep ink stains the strains of Liszt

and listen to this:

it was no strain at all to love the blue winter air

Grandmother's piano, the willow ware

the jingle bell freedom being out of school

the extravaganza of the Golden Rule

the doorbell chime the pink orange soaps

nursery rhymes and quarter notes

the red gold sunsets in the vacant lot

the shine of crystal and the dreamy cot

surely in Heaven I will greet

the winter snow stinging our cheeks again into roses

and recognize it all.

mary angela douglas 1 january 2020