Green Dress With A Sprinkling Of Roses, Hydrangeas

in Spring or just before she sighed

the soul longs for a floral dress

one of polished cotton with

a generous skirt tnat swirls

and you want to whirl

without dizziness as if

you were a child when the

green grass seemed everything

to you then the green grass

seemed like Heaven could be

and the Soul with its foreground

of polished green, its generous

sprinkling of roses, spiced 

carnations, blue

hydrangeas of pale lilies, intensified moonlight

is dancing even without the tune

mary angela douglas 12 february 2015

Sonatina In Rose

to live in a house with rose patterned wall papers

overlooking a rose garden

and when it snows, the roses merely sparkle

not forgetting to bloom.

to drift from rose room to room

as if you were fine perfume.

the venetian blinds are pink.

the tablecloths pale green.

you play the piano and then it seems

that music blooms and remembers your name.

how when the rose gold of familiar clouds shifts

over the trees

will you explain to the neighbors

to the angels at their ease

the tint of your windows.

or how will you even care

who live, a rose, among roses

anywhere you dream this.

mary angela douglas 26 january 2015

The Silence Of Lorca

[to the green memory of Federico Garcia-Lorca]

the green moon still in eclipse.

a mantle breaks out into roses overnight.

and fades. by dawn.

dawn over Spain.

the lawns with little flowers

little flowers suspire

while the Princess in pale lawn
cannot explain.

why.  why. 
no one is there to sing.

to gather the late blooming elegies

requires more music than the heart has left.

a reverse of the sudden executions.

the execution of music
sobbed the Princesa
into a milky sky of glass.

rescinding all orders

it has washed out; is it lost at sea?

who wanted a mall

a stadium where he bled?

where he has bled the last

ribbon of moonlight; white white lead.

and who is there left to show in colours of the limonero

what is under our eyes that breaks into flowers-

if not, snow?

or remains behind to gather the laments

in an emerald book

in an emerald book and though we look and strain to hear

oh año tras año
lemon bitter, year on year

who can contemplate: 

the silence  of Lorca-

without tears?

mary angela douglas 15 october 2014;10 november 2014

Impressions Of The Death Of Garcia-Lorca: On The Piano Of Pale Green Velvet

["I want to sleep the dream of the apples,

to withdraw from the tumult of cemeteries

I want to sleep the dream of that child

who wanted to cut his heart on the high seas."

-Federico Garcia-Lorca]

a piano piece:

of the child who wanted to cut his heart

on Poetry of the child with the silvery
 voice inlaid as if into jeweled light- then

fretted into diamonds continually; the child

set like a jewel on green velvet, set like a jewel;

like starlight scissored out of the skies by prescient children

for a keepsake.  Mama?  see?

and far away and here (in both Castles), simultaneously

murmurs the child who was cut, who was cut like moonlight

out of nocturnes endlessly and from the matinees.

lamented, pedaled over now in the phrasing there is
  a silence like snow;

far off, like lunar song.

and in the gardens of the kings not so mysteriously

disappearing so that who can recount the wrong

even the roses know and whisper through clouded nights:

there is no more music like this.

and the trees on green velvet sobbing diamonds suddenly

for the breezes too young to know the voice

they will carry now

nunca mas

and the cut carnations in the vases of the Princess

 forming no fit bouquets. all is listless

as the olive winds tossing the fevered ship,

no longer.

mary angela douglas 28 june 2014;rev. 21 april 2015;27 may 2019

Green Mercies Poured Out In A Waking Dream

[on the canonization of St. John Paul II and St. John XXIII]

green mercies poured out in a waking dream

and this is earth, we cried! and may we

drink the chalice of His skies swirling with

stars and colours.

green mercies poured out in a living stream

and I have gathered violet on violet in this late spring

the dark purpureal and the pale lavender and still

I cannot dream enough. 

and the skies are flecked with doves and the

doves with rainbows and all my prismed sighs

have broken into music.

green mercies flowed into

the sea of all colours the ruffling waves above

the precipice of hope.

and the white bells rang white music, snows

of mercies in a sky of dreams with the imprint of leaves

and ferns in shaded places

where there is no more weariness.

mary angela douglas 27 april 2014

Selling Garcia-Lorca

"...a las cinco de la tarde..."

-Federico Garcia-Lorca

selling Garcia-Lorca

I walked to the edge of

the olive-groved sea

and wept into it.

citrusly the stars shone down

on the next-to-the-last moon

in its lemon yellow binding.

selling Garcia-Lorca -  all-

all the deep

grass-shadowed singing

with the fabulous flowers

opening to the same green page...

I try to forget I had to barter you

(bilingual edition)

serenely complete in a world of inquisitions.

and now, es que yo no estoy completa,

la sombra beatifica lo sabe*

I cannot ransom you.

they paid me 41.20 in the bookstore

for the entire works of Garcia Lorca

enough for bus-fare home but

I spent 40 dollars, pure

oro de mi corazon

in another lifetime;

skipping lunch forever

(well, I would have)

purchasing sweet words

unfiltered, cerise as pomegranates.

silver, under the gnarled trees, I say goodbye

to you now precisely

where you were bordering

my mind-

oh-

infinite brocade...

now like Rachel 

I cannot be consoled

and the lemon moon strives with me

only because I cannot ransom you

with tears either silver or gold-

though they, like poetry, are legion...

mary angela douglas 22 august 2009;rev. 2 april 2014

**but I am not complete and the beatific shadow knows it

(first draft, Spanish translation of first version of poem)

La Venta de Garcia-Lorca

"...a las cinco de la tarde..."

-Federico Garcia-Lorca

en la venta de Garcia-Lorca

me acerque a la orilla

 del mar de olivares

y llore en el.

estrellas citricos brillaba

en la siguiente a la ultima luna

en su enlace amarillo limon

en la venta de garcia-lorca todo,

todo lo profundo

hierba de sombras cantando

con las flores fabulosas de apertura

de la pagina misma verde...

trato de olvidar que teni que trueque,

edicion bilingue,

completa en un mundo de incompletas

y ahora es que yo no estoy completa

la sombra beatifica lo sabe

y yo no puedo rescatarle

que pagaron 1.20 en la libreria

para las obras completas de Garcia-Lorca

suficiente para el hogar billete de autobus pero

pague 40 dolares en otra vida

sin el almuerzo en muchas

ocasiones para comprar palabras sin filtro

y crezas como la granada.

plata, en las aceitunes,

me depido de usted en el que estuvimos

a mi mente

ahora como rachel yo no puedo ser consolado

y no se puede rescatar que a pesar de que

con lagrimas, como la poesia, son legion

mary angela douglas translation completed 29 june 2011

Chaconne For Federico

[to Federico Garcia-Lorca]

the paper birds won’t sing here anymore

the crystal birds can’t fly – they say

the moon is leaving home

and I don’t know why

the children turn away

from oranges from sweets from ruby fountains

how softly the angels

carried their carnations

on the day

your windmill was repealed-

Quixote having no tears left

bowed down under

a moon of shaded green…

how stars of pomegranate

should rain down

and the silver sea grow olive-colored

as it did beneath your gaze-

but words can no longer be found

for so many things and the soul sheds

golden wings and aureoles unknowingly.

they will not ambush

your hidden flights of jade

poetry my wounded bird poetry

my wounded bird

mary angela douglas 17 november 2009

Una Chacona por Federico

[ Federico Garcia-Lorca]

los aves de papel no quieren cantar nunca mas

los aves de cristal no pueden volar - dicen que

la luna se va para siempre de

su hogar

y yo no se porque

los ninos se alejan

de naranjas de dulces

de las fuentes de rudi.

que suave han llevado

los angeles sus claveles

en el dia en que

su molino de viento ha revocado.

Quixote

a quien no le quedan lagrimas

se inclinaron abajo de

su luna de verde sombreada.

como estrellas de granada

deberian llover

y la mar de plata debe cambiar

a color de aceite tanto

como hago

abajo de su mirada-

pero las palabras

ya no pueden ser

encontradas

por tantas cosas y la alma derrama

sin saber

las alas de oro y las aureolas-

ellos no van a emboscarte

sus vuelos escondidas de jade-

la poesia mi ave herida

la poesia mi ave herida

mary angela douglas 17 november 2009/Spanish translation april 24, 2011