Meditation On Death And The Early Violets

we wait our turn to go home

as children wait for the ferris wheel at the fair

anticipating if I could only touch the pink clouds,

BE in the air

what then would I be

or where or how

so many summers passed  we wonder our arithmetic

could last and it's a different word problem

now than when all we had to do was figure out how many

apples among how many friends and with bright illustrations

it could all be divided into

so we wait and in our dreams there is a kind of summation where

its snowing bushels of moons and the orchards have lost

innumerable blooms

they lie on the ground past all pink  thundering or is it apricot

I have dropped the shimmering skein of my own imagery

or forgotten to lock the stitches in by knotting the thread

and I     dread the colorful unraveling of all I ever said

thought or loved and I wish for some apotheosis instead

some rose embroidered progression up a handy ladder

propped up against bright hearted Infinity

where I could step lightly from this skin into the

everlasting one where song will be effortless and yet,

again, somehow it was for me on this earth

the only easy thing to sing amid the ruins.

to call the beauteous things departing back to me.

the early violets. the riddle of Time so blissful in music

the princess could never resolve.

mary angela douglas 25 april 2021

In Hard Times, With Only The Dimestore Jewelry Left

could I sell my dimestore jewelry

down by the Spring?

at least I could wash my face

the Princess thought

who hadn't packed her mirrors.

what are mirrors when no

one recognizes you anyway

she had thought, at the last minute

taking only an extra summer jumper

a basket for berries, the
clip earrings.

someday there will be bread

she dreamed.

and that will seem

like a Wedding.

mary angela douglas 24 march 2015

Red Carnival Glass: Sunburst, Pin Wheel

through rainwater pools of red carnival glass

I splashed through sunsets where nothing smashed

nothing was shattered

only a watercolour blur

only a whispered word

and iridescence spills into the poems

I write and I can't help it cried

the princess weeping pearls as she fled

this is what happens when you're

enchanted;

whenever God calls after you

mary angela douglas 24 march 2015

Her Hair In The Picture Was Braided With Jewels

her hair in the picture was braided with jewels

she quite forgot were there

unconscious in the sunlight of her beauty rare.

this was a real princess, I thought.

and turned the page. and the sun was still out.

and it was the same day

though the jewels were darker somehow

who can say why

old picture books make me cry;

the ones they published

before the Great War

for children

going out the door

and the wind, suddenly coming up

in their faces.

mary angela douglas 8 march 2015

Sweet Secrets Of Grade School Continents I Remember

sweet secrets of grade school continents I remember.
how the desk smelled like peanut butter
when you rested your head on it

until you heard like a sing songing bird
the teacher chirp
put your thinking caps on, little boys and girls!

we didn't think we were little
as we fastened on invisible hats
quite seriously.

we were there and so we listened
to the Grand Canyon Suite on the classroom record player
over and over

or saw Velvet win the National
on the auditorium screen
each and every spring.

or square danced on an early evening stage
for the P.T.A.

with lukewarm cokes served afterwards
the kind in the green glass bottles.
later it would be layer cakes and

cake walks, penny valentines on stiff cardboard.
I love. I love, oh who? just violets
because they're blue. and foldover bread

with butter and sugar

and Christmas parties on the last day of school
before the snow flies and the tinsel stars.

come out come out wherever you are

and recess when we can play anything.
and pinch frail honeysuckle off the vine.
and midday breaks for ice cream cups

are fine
with their flat wooden spoons
and one exact scoop of vanilla

packed to the rim.

and soon, you're home
in the twilight blue again
saying hello to

the backyard moon
your own favorite clouds
you chalked in pastels

on Art Day on manilla paper.

and when it hurts too much
these attics things put by I say
just remember the tall tales in the readers.

Babe the Blue (blue raspberry blue) Ox lumbering through.
and for a while,

The Princess Who Never Smiled.

mary angela douglas 7 march 2015;rev. 8 march 2015

Etagere

its the dreamy mint green that intensifies

around the rose, violet pattern

of the demitasse bone china cups on the etagere;

of the demitasse bone china cups

perhaps they are rimmed in gold

or afternoon sunlight

for the child that can only stare

at a rose garden world represented this way:

as if the angels slept the dream of the roses

whispered Garcia-Lorca from somewhere

in Spanish en el jardin.

you know, the one where there are fountains

of rose perfume and a little room where

the angels dress for supper

of lightly toasted cheese and

chocolate afterwards.

and stories of princesses,

their collections on the etagere...

mary angela douglas 8 february 2015

When The Swans Turned Home

it isn't fair could she have said

to the chill in the corners:

these impossible fairytale deadlines...

here is the room of straw.

the task of gold.

and not much time at all

for learning now what you should have learned,

then. so tears begin and the question of the hour:

will winter ever set?

and then a bargain's made

with trolls in a bad temper.

is there any other way?

and coach worthy pumpkins are sorted from the patch;

rag bags fetched into gowns.

or in a room of forest green

mute as an ancient spell

the princess weaves seven shirts

and one with an unfinished sleeve

that will forever be a wing

when the swans turn home.

mary angela douglas 13 january 2015

Perhaps You Will See And You Won't Know Why

perhaps you will see and you won't know why

Napoleon's horses in the clouds;

Beethoven weeping a lost quartet

pale, the bouquet meant

for the princess gone from view:

it was small white roses

tightly bunched

and silver ribbons.

her mother in a starry crown

looks down on earth.

she looks down on earth

when the Princess is sleeping.

the princess is sleeping;

is she dreaming her Christmas dream:

the one about the Great Ballets?

in her dream her mother is happy;

in the morning, they will meet again

mary angela douglas 16 december 2014

Who Dreamed That Coming Back To Life Would Be This Way

who dreamed that coming back to life would be this way?

pink blossoms flaring in the cold and snows flowing away

and the trickle of Time under the ice gives way.

little by little the numbness in the soul will melt as well

and trance by trance be freed from the evil spell.

the Princess in rose again in the garden;

the birds quickening in the bird-cherry tree

and all the ships at sea and all the ships at sea

at the same tangerine instant: portside

and children are brave again with oranges in their hands

mary angela douglas 11 december 2014

Note on the poem: the bird-cherry tree is a cherry tree especially loved by the film maker Andrei Tarkovsky. It is indicated slightly in this poem-painting in tribute to him.

Perhaps The Thirteenth Fairy Wept At Home

perhaps the thirteenth fairy wept at home

under her polka dot toadstool barely

kept from the monsoons

bewildered and bedazzling; why she cried

to the cloudy skies do I never get invited anywhere?

she used her time like Cinderella, mending their socks.

putting up strawberry, elderberry jams. is that enough,

she wondered? then she swept their stairs and tuckered out,

though she was lighter than fluff, she slept through

their tiptoeing out without her.

then, the Princess came and it was just too much

to be the only one in the Kingdom not there.

so she party crashed the christening;
 glimpsing the Princess, rose-like, fair.

and thought to do her a kindness.

sleep one hundred years she wished to their despair.

sparing her 100 years of War.

mary angela douglas 28 november 2014

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

I Went Back To Find The Golden

I went back to find the golden

age, finding it among

the things you left behind:

your old papers, sausage,

bread and cheese.

the artifacts that fell into

your hands

as if in a fairytale:

a bird on a crystal twig, pink

and blue towers,

a sobbing princess, elaborate

valentines.

a signet ring with no inscription,

strawberries and cream, a

propensity for suddenly appearing,

a beautiful acuity.

silver and gold

I found, rubies

strewn everywhere, a rose-red

flamingo,

slightly out of place-

an iridescence like

snow remembered.

old shoes in the corner

with hidden properties,

Van Gogh's orchards, Cezanne's

reticence, "a cloud

shaped like a piano"*, Chekov's

last spoken word-

the colors of hydrangea,

Dvorak in a newer world,

my soul

mary angela douglas 8 february 2009

*a line from Chekov's Seagull