SHE WISHES SOMEHOW STILL A REPRIEVE FROM HEAVEN

 

won't we feel lonesome then in Heaven

for the way the stars looked from earth

in Heaven they must be so close

as though we'd flown into the core of them

and turned ourselves all silver and plum

but o from earth they gather in clusters

when you're out in the country

and seem to be winking at you

a thousand thousand radiant seeds

just the same as in childhood

when your Grandfather said

yes, child we live in the Milky Way

how hard to give up the earliest view of them

and flowers, and the earth after rain

the fragrances

no wonder men wished to live here forever

despite wars or sickness or unexplainable glooms,

misfortunes

we grew so used to being here

sending our roots down deep

as though we were ancient trees

oh please I whisper to the Heavens

to the gatekeepers there

in early summer when the trees are too green

I am not ready yet

and doubt I ever shall be

mary angela douglas 30 june 2023

WHERE WAS GOD

light has a way of entering the room

effulgent with angels

when most you feel gloom

even harried to your doom

can't this be God, too

where is He; is He?

where was He too

we so deride him

when the battle's through

and all our friends almost

are slaughtered or have disappeared,

from view.

I think that He was in the light

to comfort us in all our fright, our dread

to lead us brightly from the room

when we encountered doom past doom

He leads us softly, Home.

mary angela douglas 29 june 2023

LIGHT SOMEHOW BLOSSOMS FROM A THOUSAND WOUNDS

light somehow blossoms from a thousand wounds

and this is poetry you say as the music flows away

and then resumes leaving a watermark you can't explain

tip the candle in the flame and read aloud or to yourself

or with hardly a sound at all

nothing in the universe will call to you more vividly

than the real thing

renouncing it all, notoriety or fame

let the secret cherished in you survive

and find the poetry in you

with each poem, more blazingly alive.

mary angela douglas  28 june 2023

EXQUISITELY, SO BEAUTIFULLY, SHE LINGERS

for Virginia Woolf

exquisitely, so beautifully how she lingers

in consciousness even her shadow brighter than Light

ever in the maze of her own amazement a quadrille all her own,

immeasurable flight

flaring for awhile in myriad remonstrances, attitudes

the blue green sea stains of her own footsteps in a room

like a seamaid retracing, literary mermaid the possibilities

of life on the shore but looking out to sea

steadfast. embattled, a blue green constancy.

how I wish I wish I wish she had not blown herself out

like a drowned and lavish candle, dear Virginia. Ophelia like

yet candelabra like, of a clear obdurate crystal, prismatic

turning on a stair

between life and disappearances. everywhere one looks

and looks for you again.

surely in the wide mercy of God there is room for you

in your voice that chimes its own language

beats against the current and is gone

yet never gone; haunting beckoning in our imaginations

in a high language looking back on time. transitions

so breakable beaconlike enshrining the vague moon that

asks in gold where you are? you in the music of

the loss of dear ones, a shower of petals in the wind

like a drowned candle rise impeccably again

angel of the household still of poetry

the implacable distances of the years

whom we cannot replace.wayward;

a depth, like the seas.

mary angela douglas 28 june 2023

A SONG OF COMFORT FOR LITTLE BUGS

 

little bugs

Im sorry that we fell

and made your tiny lives

like a living hell

unwelcome everywhere 

on the porch or on the stair

hiding under rugs

oh my little bugs

no one wants you near

that is crystal clear

creeping things God made

in His vast parade

do you late at night

wish he'd made you starlight, starlight

somewhere in the sky

later bye and bye

you will find a home

not be made to roam

no more Raid

sprayed and sprayed

happy in the shade

near the ice cream tubs

the berries on the shrubs

oh my tiny cherubs, cherubs

crowned and crowned anew

for all the things you do

faster than a cheetah, a cheetah

bob and wave again

sashay with no sin

round the racing track

of my favorite tea tray, tea tray

and all you ever dreamed

the froth upon the cream

kettle steam for you

welcome where you are

flawless as a star

oh my dearie bugs

you were made by Love.

mary angela douglas 28 june 2023

THE RUBY RED QUEEN REMEMBERED

 

of course the main thing she will want to be remembered for is

fairness

off with their heads was said to everyone in turn

especially before their turn

cart before horse is best her happy children always reminisced

in the film footage

a sentimental tear in each eye

Mummy loved red roses best

hand painted; her passion for art

and horticulture so exacting the workers perished in the heat

without a centa for turning the whimpy white roses all magenta

she was such a tireless yeoman for beauty

why couldn't anyone understand she wept

some would say, she raged

my stagecraft is not appreciated here!

its easy in storybooks to just wake up

nudged by your kittycat on the riverbank

and get out of it

on a most superior summer afternoon

but in real life it isn't so easy

sentencing before trial

and oh, my heart,

you are whisked away

a thousand million alices a day

a lot of rabbits looking the other way.

mary angela douglas 27 june 2023

QUITE A LONG TIME WE SPENT IN NEVERLAND

 

quite a long time we spent in Neverland

gathering up sea glass

to repair the dome of life;

prismatic spyglasses.

how lovely it was to coast along the winds

blown from the northernmost stars

blurred shining, all the flowers

but the sea was too blue

my soul turned acquamarine    

after too many shadows sewn

I couldnt remember a thing

that was ever told straight on.

I still remember old stories about the coves

and wonder was that me back then

just a girl in a soft blue gown

like a weathervane

but late for the ballets;

never turning.

mary angela douglas 27 june 2023

KABAKOVIAN SUMMER, ILYA TO EMILIA, PERHAPS

for Ilya and Emilia Kabakov

in memoriam, Ilya Kabakov (September 30, 1933-May 27, 2023)

taken this way, sorrow is almost Atlantis, Kitezh rising

from a dreamy lake disguised in children's daydreams

rising from the roofs like wounded swans imperial

when shall I rise when shall I paint old dawns

as if there were angels thronging to meet us

on the other side of all the museum pieces

until they are more than bearable

filled with the silver point of what I imagined to be  true

that invisible cities resided behind old baseboards

of the bittersweet afternoons of the glorious installations

of our love

that we were citizens

of the heavenly country beyond the trivialities

and that we would not falter, even turned to dust.

forgive me dear that now as a ghost of the former Long Island,

Soviet Union, Venice draped in negligible purple 

I can no longer eat the golden pears of summer

that I have drawn for you now

upon the rickety table, among things familiar

to us both.

mary angela douglas 26 june 2023;30 june 2023

FERNLIKE IN ITS INTENTION THE EMERALD SUN OVER OZ

fernlike in its intention the emerald sun over oz

seeks water in the lowlands

and cannot quench its thirst for home

shall we wear green shades forever

pretending we are all the same

for once then and then never 

denizens of Oz

why does my quandry wander off the page

in search of resolution

I have seen emeralds in my day too

and corn husking yellows

which is which

in the end it is hard to say

dreaming or awake

which kingdom is best

mary angela douglas 26 june 2023

THE WILD SWANS BY HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN

 

in the fleece of that story I could have wrapped my life

even for centuries the story of the Wild Swans. of Elise

the princess and her strange destiny, outcast with her brothers

and her brothers turned into swans.

no longer they wrote upon slates of crystal

in flourishing handwriting

with ink of gold

but bought and sold by a sorceress lost the earth

condemned to fly forever till the bells of Christendom

rang out.

until Elise in a dream sought how to save them

and it was revealed to her: you shall be dumb and appear

dimwitted though you shine inside with a thousand suns

and silent you shall weave with nettles shirts for your brothers

pale as linen, gleaming shedding the blood of your lily hands

invisibbly upon the woven goods

and if you speak a word, they never shall be free.

then on the brink of sundown came her brothers and in a net

of pure sapphire rose above the clouds high over the sea illimitable

and carried her and carried her in such a folkloric dream

and then they drew nigh and turned back into men

for a little space and sister and brothers sang hymns upon

the last rock in the sea necessary for them while the waves

crashed around them.

then she awoke

but waking was grieving

grieving and weaving

till they were free

I will do this I said night and day

I will weave poems from nettles

and say little else

and I am not myself

one day they will be freed

we will sing above the noise of the sea

free from the sorrowful kingdoms.

mary angela douglas 26 june 2023

THE NOSTALGIA FOR BEAUTY

 

all the dragon slayers run away

those with brandished swords in Arthur's realm

those with time to kill will march again

raising voices impotent and shrill

can I please go back I ask of the risen Lord

to when people still at least loved the legendary

even if they didn't quite live up to it

to when we gazed as if the whole world

were our homeland and at peace

at the pink and blue skies

like pure confection.

I weep for the wandering

for all evicted from Time

for the ghosts that lingered

on the cusp of the Sublime

seeking in all things

the nostalgia for beauty.

quiescent under the golden moon.

mary angela douglas 25 june 2023

EVEN IF YOU NEVER GOT YOUR WISH FROM THE DREAM CATALOG

 

I never wanted inner or outer flamboyance

what's the point to try to outshine by eccentricity

outdo forever even the most immortal circus act

to fly profesionally with Icarian wings

and not to drown?

wear the sunsets that you remember as a child

entranced how about that

not to impress anyone but just because

you're still glad you're on the earth

even if you never got your wish from the dream catalog

even if every molecule is tired from trying NOT

to look the part

to be the role

breathe the garden air, the gardens of a thousand summers

and be still.

truly God is God and ever will be

isn't that enough splendor for one lifetime?

mary angela douglas 24 june 2023

MIDWESTERN, FAR WESTERN MIRAGE

 to my Grandfather, with love, Milton Barkus Young

there's storms in the plains

and the wind sails through

and the lost and the ghostlands

are making do too

and the rail fence is busted.

the cows won't come home

black stars in the loaming

won't leave me alone

my heart's in the midwest

my lingering sky, my soul's in the far west

with snows bound to fly

and sweep like a new broom

the clouds bye and bye

my dreams are all restless

the air is so new

and vast and archetypal

in all shades of blue

the scrub and the sagebrush

seem long overdue.

I'm turning folkloric

and long for the West

the mythical sagas

that I learned the best

by heart and by dreaming

the long ride is through

yet still I keep crooning:

those strawberry moons...

mary angela douglas 24 june 2023

THE LORD GOD SPEAKING OUT OF THE WHIRLWIND

 

the sky is a tear that will break the dam

in midnight hours

when there's none awake

and roses quake already in tune

with the darkening sun

eclipsing at noon

the birds grow silent 

expecting doom

and no one no one is listening

out of the sky came the hand of God glistening

trying to save us but no one saw

trying to tell us

abandon it all and flee

my children my children who listen to Me

all things have sorted the leaves from the trees

in a gust like thunder

the sense of unease

all things are silent

shut off the computers and your tvs

listen my children oh listen to me

the hour is coming o run from the seas

I need you to hear me

to hear my plea

the winds grow strong.

it won't be long.

what's coming is coming,,,

oh hear me inside of the darkening squall

the sky is a tear that will flood almost all.

I love you.

mary angela douglas 24 june 2023

MUST BE NICE TO BE KING

do the stars

perfectly have to align

for you to have the perfect time

does candy in the jars

leap at your command

into your impatient hand

must be nice to be king

do old phones in your dream

ring and ring and dial your wrong number

can you get by if you try when there's a little thunder

learn to be still I know you will

happy in doing not a thing at all

let the mail pile up

curdled creamy coffee in your cup be left alone

the parrot shriek and the orchids remonstrate

when it snows let the whole kingdom shut down

all over town

turning over no new stone

be glad

you are home.

mary angela douglas 23 june 2023

RHYME UNSCHEMING

 

chimeless at midnight burn the stars

the latitude of who you are,

faultless meridians.

being or seeming up for grabs

pinata creaming or subject to labs

to pluck at your harplike brain

the bats have come so far

out of the temples and into the rains

sift the wheat but not the grain

take what is offered or

cry to God on high

I only want to live until I die

and then in the jeweled rains

to know, You are nigh.

mary angela douglas 22 june 2023

THE MYSTIC WORKER ON THE JOB INADVERTENTLY STEALING TIME

 

sometimes within us, an interstellar light 

floods the flood plains of our inner sight

right in the factories of the middle of the day

keep your head down lest someone see and discern

from middle management

of the royal rubber stamping

of the grim Grimm working day

your head is full of visions scraps of fairytales

you cannot banish away despite company policy

not only, how may I help you today

interplanetary worm holes

secret cherishing forays

into the beautiful.

check on the next customer in your drab uniform

with your eyes a little downcast at the register

registering the light years travel of the waves

under the piped in music that makes people buy MORE

the irrepressible sonics of saints and angels o strive

not to show you have been up all night and that

you are still alive

like Pascal, awash in stellar snows

or Dante in the breakout dazzling of the intemperate

presence of God concocting the Rose

leaving peculiar glitter on the lawns

and where you walk, taking inventory now

trying not to get caught

for stealing time as they call it in HR just in your mind

remembering what you saw

in the panoramic midnight before the bus fumed dawn.

mary angela douglas 22 june 2023

WHAT THE LETTER OF THE LAW CAN ACHIEVE IN GOVERNMENT HOUSING

the sun appears and there is green grass in the picture under glass

a small farmhouse, a cherry tree and children playing

dressed in primitive art colours

a painting in my erstwhile home.

this is more beautiful than the letter of the law

and has made of my heart a valentine with all the doves

oh what can the letter of the law achieve

the cold contract

the lease that grieves and shocks and aftershocks

oh God I thank you for covenants

for the unquenched spirit free as light

for that which does not break my heart into pieces

as though it were kindling.

you are in violation of your lease

the baseless letter read with its super vague charge

of lack of housework

in triplicate lies.

oh Mary has chosen the better part

greenly whispered the Holy Ghost

recalling the sweet words of Christ

"which shall not be taken from her."

what lease I said to God Almighty.

we have a covenant.

mary angela douglas 21 june 2023

A RUDINESS AS OF RUBIES

 

the latter days fall

in sweet domino effect

like tin soldiers

goodbye! you say so heartfeltly

to each one in its turn

as if you were still that Christmas child;

or like the wooden ones in the Brontes Glasstown

taking part in all the epics

or in the case of Hans Andersen

the one and only soldier lives out his ballet

where have the winds gone that gusted him away

and back again in the story we adored

oh to be faithful like that again

to accept without question the fairytale

quest

while the apple trees are snowing

in the dream where time is still your friend

and the skies glow a rudiness as of rubies

all apple red delicious

while you're still at home, 

the last candle to go out.

mary angela douglas 21 june 2023

SOLSTICE

 

today is the summer solstice

perhaps you too, like me

await this very day

some fate we cannot comprehend yet

perhaps the sun will smote us down

in this proud summer

maybe even without knowing

you or I with the sun in the sky

and the birds all singing

may stand in front of frozen in time

the recurring Red Sea moment again.

if that is so, my unseen friends

weep not.

it seems the world belongs to the cruel

but God made it, who is infinitely kind.

comfort yourself with even the smallest breeze

the green leaves turning

oh why lament

how it feels to be disgraced

humiliated

these things will not prevail forever

your heart is a pearl

not to be bruised this endlessly.

breathe deep in the solstice of your soul.

awaiting what the day will bring

somewhere there are glad tidings

even now let the tide of unseen kindness

reach your shores

don't be afraid

the God of peace is yours.

endure.

mary angela douglas 21 june 2023

MAY THE GOOD LORD DEFEND US FROM THE MEAN

 

strict and unfeeling

born to be mean

deliver us from the trivial Lord

the exacting and the pristine.

those with all duckies in a row

waiting to stomp on

those who're too slow.

born to wreak havoc in quiet ways

and then bring home medals 

for all they have slayed.

beauitifiul earth of blues and greens

I love you so

but I dont love the mean

I hate it when they are given power

to make a misery of all our hours.

God grant the merciful eternal reprieve

God keep the meanies

away from me.

mary angela douglas 20 june 2023

SUPPLICATION

 

the earth on which we stand or fall

into sudden ditches or trenches or are pushed

the earth with its sky blues overhead

its wounding of birds

in the winter sunsets

songs gone suddenly silent.

what poet has not loved

despite all treachery.

so has beauty reflecting you oh God of all our days

been formed even bleeding Time and drop by drop

by men at the last breath, pledged to the last breath

who knew singing, continual praise past all lament

was a truly golden thing of all golden things remaining here.

and, save the beating heart, the best, the tear drenched ecstatic

artifact in the disarray that shines forth even from mass graves

illicit dungeons and where the children are misled.

let not the sere, the disenchanting scoundrels

take it all when we are dead.

and guard our ragged souls still singing on.

mary angela douglas 20 june 2023

SMALL CANCION ON DISAPPEARING (FINAL VERSION)

 

Small Canción On Disappearing

stepping over the footbridge

we cannot see

because by then we mist will be

a long time this had been in my dream

and going the way of the rose,

the moldering scarlet leaf, the snows

the bird that was singing just last May, the way of all grieved;

ever and ever our fate draws nigh

and nothing to do for it but sigh

it has been so lovely being here

then like the dew

on the cloud clad mountain,

to disappear...

but should you think

that is all that is all

I could sing or say to you in my blue shawl

my best blue dress

I will return when you least believe

and seem so unlikely to be blessed

to say,it was not as we conceived

the way was pearl and the bells pealed then

and mist is only the train we were in

to round the curve of Eternity's bend

mary angela douglas 1 october 2021

WONDERLAND

 

if you think about it I mean really Wonderland

was not that good of a place

although we thank Walt Disney in his genial kindness

turning it into a kind of fun tea party, inventing the tea cup

spin ride

at the original Disneyland in Anaheim

and that lovely song, A Golden Afternoon I could have listened

to for years

from the record my Grandmother gave us

of the soundtrack, my sister and I who very like Alice

also loved blue frocks.

But really I knew then

having read the book many times over both parts: it was a

seriously distressing valentine of a

place though Alice coped as well as anyone could have

who expected things to be reasonably comfy that were called

tea parties.

still, where things go contrary to everything you learned in

school

or at home about the importance of having good manners

what is one to do and where it is possible to drown in your

own tears suddenly

to be too large, to be too small

to be unwelcome after all

though one loves the plight

of the wounded White Knight and his predicaments

even after engraved invitations

in near bridal calligraphy fall through

well, the mock turtle was too morose

going through the mirror proved nothing

except people are all made of glass

and very touchy.

especially the Red Queen

who sentences everyone all the time

before there is any evidence whatsoever

and makes up new infractions for rules that dont exist

and persists in believing she has the power

to alter the colour of roses at whim.

or me, said Alice.said alice, later on every hour

on the hour

the clock chimed backwards

and by royal decree.

mary angela douglas 18 june 2023

FOR THAT WHICH IS BEAUTIFUL THE POETS CARRIED WATER (FINAL VERSION)

 

we would have painted clouds on the horizon

to keep her from thirst

or carried the last drop of water in a thimble

across ten saharas

this much we cared for Beauty

for the ark embroidered song

and the seven rainbows

though masses cried you do us wrong

who speak no word to revolution

but I, I who have bartered the need to belong am happy

for the feeling all along sans restitution

that paper roses (poems) could bloom and just like that

become the real thing

or you could find yourself on the wrong train going back in a dream

and suddenly step off into a field of pink clouds forever

concealed from the grisly righteous

to tell such stories was our aim

to keep her from wandering away

her lilied hem from trailing in the dust

to keep the yellow light in the rain soaked window

all through winter alight and bear the living flame

that we should find in God bright raiment again

without a coin without a name, still let beauty ever reign

though we're looked at with disdain by all the socially thundering

that children may hunt flowers and stars, bright agates

and not lose wonder.

mary angela douglas 8 october 2021;18 june 2023

WHY DON'T YOU (COMPOSITION NO. 2, AGAIN FOR DIANA VREELAND) FOR HER LONG AGO FANTASTICAL FASHION COLUMN E0NTITLED WHY DONT YOU

 

again, to Diana Vreeland

Why don't you...

drink coffee with cream in it from the long ago

when you were living in the Milky Way...

watch carriages come and go and lined in cherry silk,

from a high window...

at purple twilight wear Tweed cologne

in a polka dot dress splashed gold and vermillion

declaim the poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins

or hop a bus on a pink and blue White Night

thinking of old Rus and bartered fairy tales

and Venice, when Mandelstam was young

and all the glory

of the Poetry to come

and warble Christmas carols

from a summer pier

and wear the soul's light mercy

for the more than anguished years.

mary angela douglas 3 october 2021

CATALPA TREE IN THE DISTRICT (FINAL VERSION)

 

once I loved a catalpa tree

because its leaves stirred heart shaped in the wind

and it was outside the window my only window

living in a yellow house in just one room, an amiable renter, and

sometimes on a screened in porch 

where the sun turned my rose spined books a faint pink

and my newsprint map taped up of where the heart spent refugees went

that was when I loved even more than the whiff of lilac on the wind,

the story of emigres who learned to live in books;

the legends of swans.

I saved my coins and went to the ballet

and dreamed then, a different choreography for my life

and like St. Francis I believed that it was right

all things should shine my sister, my brother.

sometimes I still believe that.

it has been a long time now

since the workmen came and sawed the tree down to the ground

where its orphaned birds fluttered around the stump;mystified

why should it die

because it soared and spread its heart helplessly over the wires;

there was no warning

but what would they say

we have come to kill the catalpa tree today>

the city sent us.

mary angela douglas 8 october 2021

PROMISE

 

the cold in summer the ice cube cold refreshment

when you are fevered and restless hanging like a scarecrow

wilted in the heat the cold you can imagine in your sleep

in quenching dreams

write about that I taught my heart and learn to sing about the

green grass newly sprung

they wrote about before when they were merry and young

lost poets centuries ago not lost to me

their minstrelsy

why should I forget them who kept me gracious company

write about fountains of grace

take your place with them

I told my soul and smiled

into the long mirrors of their singing

even if the birds turn back and the springs retreat

write of joy, and little of grief

that others may find sweet relief and you yourself,

it's true

in the gold lining the thundercloud

of rain spilling, splashing onto the wilderness flowers

in the shade of the moon of promise.

and in your vernal hours.

mary angela douglas 14 june 2023

BREAKING THE BEAUTIFUL LANGUAGE: For T.S. and ETC. (FINAL VERSION)

we broke the beautiful language

because we were petulant, bored with ourselves

between the wars or drudging toward the last one

gathering in the small cafes, life on the cheap.

was very sweet.

dissatisfied, ambitious for sure.

fuming at lilacs

dreaming of greasy chops

we made a name.

and scorned the blue fairy Hope

and left to the world,

the golden carriage without the spokes,

our crummy disdain.

our listless need

to paint ourselves into corners 

to predict the apocalypse in a languid way.

we broke the beautiful language

thinking we could always call it back

it was ours, wasn't it? knowing its place.

blaming the war for our distemper, high dogies

we decreed

men should all desultory be

and we the kings of desultory lands.

or  desultory poetry, at least.

no place for singing birds

but how we loved the absurd

oh we were kings.

we broke the beautiful language

sending it weeping away

we reconvened the human race as now

forever clinging to the wreckage

without God (-you SODS-I sobbed on coming to

your place in the road)

and had another cafe au lait, a few smokes left.

and we were pleased

with ourselves and our unease, our poseur's angst

foisted on future generations.

just a few dissatisfied poetasters

philosophers, feasted on gloom.

just about ruined

the English language and human fortitude

crushing the spirit of their  time, already crushed.

and maybe yours right now, your spirit. Listen.

adrift in Paris, under the lime trees

with your clear brow furrowed thinking on vapid dirges.

who needs them.

mary angela douglas 13 june 2023;29 june 2023    

note on the poem: I do mean dogies, as in motherless calves;I did not mispell doggies.

AND RAISE THY BANNER

to William Shakespeare and all the others..., to Poetry itself in all its finest hours

keep watch on the waters under the bridge

lest floodtide reach again that  ridge

lest floodtide breach what cant be mended

and the world be resuspended

losing human speech, nobility impeached,

human speech and poetry Grand

I'll never never understand

why men have bartered gold for rot

and pearls of beauty long forgot and exiled.

forgot and smashed them, the sublime

into the former realms of time

and locked them in.

bewildered now we stand and see

backwaters of a robbery

that world has fallen, all the just

their musical phrases meager crusts

that should have been immune to rust

when sounded by the merciful

immune and radiant more and more

nor cast upon the bleakest shore

because they would not serve utility.

restore restore the angels cry

the hymn to singing

what cannot die

and beauteous phases of the moon

in every language now resume

that soul may sing

and joy clap hands

above the weeping- sorrowlands.

and poetry renewed may be

in every greening long lost tree

then from a golden Strand renew

our banished dreams and in revue

all lost kingdoms of the heart

blaze forth and shine out

rescued Art

lost purity return to us

and raise thy banner from the dust.

mary angela douglas 13 june 2023

YOU SHOULD READ WHAT YOU WANT TO READ

 

you should read what you want to read

even if its still little golden books

small treasuries, with one word syllables

and pictures, pristine and bright

of the gingerbread man still in flight

the pancake rolling down the hill

the Alcott apple orchards and more.

old card catalogues, wish books, almanacs

the faded directions to the castle.

Coke advertisements with a beaming Santa.

oh let me rest in appled nooks

and curl my toes in winsome brooks

and eat Divinity by the spoon

right in the middle of the afternoon

find polka dot mushrooms after rains

and seek to lessen worldly pain

by infinite magic, angelic choirs sustained

the bright moon lifted on golden wires

above the stage set in my mind

where Juliet forever refines

the braille of infinite snows.

mary angela douglas 13 june 2023

ON JOYLESS READING

 

the books we loved in sweet largesse

no longer may be second guessed

but plotted, graphed and quartered, drawn

what once was ours

in easy dawns, even as children.

and now we've given up for dole

the endless freedom of the soul

to think of this or think of that

without compulsion, torture, rack

with no inner life at all

because they think

our thoughts, too small.

the experts who are sure we need

expertise for what we read.

forego, forego, the chilling winds

that put an end to dreaming.

mary angela douglas 13 june 2023

TIME LAPSE

the wind breaks high above the seas

that once were dust so long ago

and all we love must gather speed

to indicate the future snows

oh formerly golden

cape or horn

on maps we follow

not any more

we shall the angels all implore

in hushed syllables

far from land.

for those who later

may understand.

and intercept our ghost shipped cries

time lapse, roses, rains sweep through

enchanted continents may fuse

in our imaginations grazed

by the salient, silvered restive moons

when poetry was still untuned

irradiant, spyglassed afternoons.

the seas, filled up with clouds.

mary angela douglas 13 june 2023,

THUMBELINA SCRAWLS ON A WALL IN DANDELION DUST (FINAL VERSION)

 if all they do is size you up

and make you live in a pink cracked cup

and fling you seeds when the weather's rough

then just be merry with what you've got

and don't be glarey for what you've not.

mary angela douglas 4 october 2021;12 june 2023

ON THE PAVEMENT AFTER THE MUSEUM

 

make of a star the remnants of a day

you wished so hard the sun

would not slide away

make of the rose

a kind of entryway

these things are possible and yet

why are the nightmares

always so hard to forget

oh God. 

open for us the wounded crystal door

we flee from things we hardly can ignore

open for us the breathing space of trees

and hide us in their gardens green concealed

that then with you

with forever we might not be seen

shade us in all the summer years to come

keep us from the winters so undone

though art is sweet 

and beautiful, beyond retreat

it is a fleeting drum;

only You abide.

mary angela douglas 11 june 2023

A POSSIBLE EXPLANATION

for Rainer Maria Rilke

in childhood legend he swallowed an orchard of birds

and was not the same afterwards. this was in dream.

restless, about to fly at any sudden motion

uncomfortable here among us

in the parlours with imperious horsehair sofas and the

rattling teacups

but at night o night

with its crystal pinholes

the orchard awoke inside

the birds all trable and transmitting

from soul to soul an unaccountable music

he accounted for

far into the nebulae streaming

and everywhere word

was a bird impearled

and weeping how far and distant

gleams the inner world

you cannot find.

mary angela douglas 10 june 2023

TEN CHARACTERS, HIRSHHORN MUSEUM SPRING 1990, WASHINGTON D.C.

for ilya and emilia kabakov

 

on a spring day I went to a museum

and found myself at home in the installation

so much so that I did not want to go home

but to live there.

but museums close

and we who are blown like petals to and fro

must situate ourselves in the galleries remembered.

I do remember that day.

I sat in the seat where the man who flew into his picture

floated away where he 

once sat every day

waiting for the magisterial hours

and I was feeling there

also capable of anything

pinkly let the cherry tree bloom on the wall

and birdsong ring, echoing in this still place

within a greater stillness lapping the shore

and as if I were visiting relatives

in a careless childhood and could play wherever I wanted

cared for who can say how

but with the stars overhead and no ceilings;

the angels, in my sudden premonition, pantomime

singing of

the way to save N.V.

as if, in all the world,

it only depended on you.

mary angela douglas 10 june 2023

All reactions:

1Mary Angela Douglas

INTERIM

for Ilya and Emilia Kabakov

 

how to meet an angel

nor fall into the waves

how to find a rooftop

to balance lightly there

until the wind plucks at the harps

a holy fool left there

from a distant ladder

on an unofficial stage

how to dream within a dream

the page within a page

a parenthesis of praise

how to capture moonlight

in a battered kitchen jar

preserving it a little

for the times not as they are

to follow the instructions

to leave the door ajar

to save your soul or someone's

from the official hours

to sing to hidden glory

the name of God embowered

reciting all the lilies

from a cluttered floor

to eat an apple really

and gild the magic core

to know what music's for

so mourners at the funeral

may weep into a cloud

and rain itself may hesitate

the Mysteries are so loud.

mary angela douglas 10 june 2023;15 july 2023

TOMORROW WE FLY: ILYA TO EMILIA KABAKOVA

 

in the Zone above the rooftops now

I will inscribe for you in the snowbanked clouds,

the diffident albums now the spirographed colours

we could not use on this shore

or

in all preceding dreams, a kind of reprise

startling the angels, my angel

dream the dream of the snowbanks Emilia

it wasn't what we planned but still the swans fly over

the dry, dry land

in mystical kingdoms resolved

in an unheard music. weep not.

weep not maiden.

for war is kind 

an American poet once said

we too in a wandering way

were led and farther afield

will build anew

everything we had planned to do

into all colours transposing them one by one

into the further installations

of the Sun.

mary angela douglas 8 june 2023