GHAZAL:  ONE SUMMER

 

It was nineteen sixty-eight, The Summer of Love;

patchouli and marijuana hung in the air, a murmur of love.

 

We came to San Francisco in a Volkswagen Bug,

rust-red, my heart, back-beat drummer of love.

 

I wore a peasant dress, my hair hung down my back;

you’d let yours grow into an Afro, sideburns, latecomer to love.

 

I thought “forever” meant it, that we were only tourists

at the Be-In, didn’t see your eyes rove.  A bummer, this love.

 

We became a statistic, cliché, another marriage gone bad.

I raised our daughter; you had a number of lovers.

 

My life, a rainbow fish hauled up on hooks and barbs, dulled

and dimmed.  Cast-off old tie-dye, could I have been dumber, in love?

 

© Barbara Crooker

                        Superstition Poetry Review, 2008

 

 

SUNFLOWERS

 

The sunflower

 cannot change what it is, it will always

turn toward the sun.

Tu Fu, “Feng-Hsien Return Chant”

 

In French, they are les tournesols, and they do, they do, they turn to the sun,

follow the white-hot disc on its daily rounds.  At night, no light, they nod

their sleepy heads, let their shoulders slump, then face the east

with hope each dawn.  Brown-eyed, yellow-rayed, they rasp in the wind,

a whole section of cellos.  Once, driving around a bend, I came across

a field of them bobbing, the blue sky waving madly behind them.

I wanted to stay, learn their language of oily seeds and scratchy stalks,

let the wind move through my green arms, lift my yellow hair, toss it this way

and that, my feet firm in the dirt.  Feel the earth, the yoga teacher exhorts on my tape. 

Feel the pulse of the planet.  Be the pulse.  I nod, heavy-headed, and heft my burden of light.

 

© Barbara Crooker

                        Line Dance (Word Press, 2008)

 

 

 

THIS SUMMER DAY

 

That sprinkler is at it again,

hissing and spitting its arc

of silver, and the parched

lawn is tickled green.  The air

hums with the busy traffic

of butterflies and bees,

who navigate without lane

markers, stop signs, directional

signals.  One of my friends

says we’re now in the shady

side of the garden, having moved

past pollination, fruition,

and all that bee-buzzed jazz,

into our autumn days.  But I say wait.

It’s still summer, and the breeze is full

of sweetness spilled from a million petals;

it wraps around your arms,  lifts the hair

from the back of your neck. 

The salvia, coreopsis, roses

have set the borders on fire,

and the peaches waiting to be picked

are heavy with juice.  We are still ripening

into our bodies, still in the act of becoming.

Rejoice in the day’s long sugar.

Praise that big fat tomato of a sun.

 

© Barbara Crooker

                        New Works Review, 2007

 

 

VEGETABLE LOVE

 

Feel a tomato, heft its weight in your palm,

think of buttocks, breasts, this plump pulp.

And carrots, mud clinging to the root,

gold mined from the earth's tight purse.

And asparagus, that push their heads up,

rise to meet the returning sun,

and zucchini, green torpedoes

lurking in the Sargasso depths

of their raspy stalks and scratchy leaves.

And peppers, thick walls of cool jade, a green hush.

Secret caves.  Sanctuary.

And beets, the dark blood of the earth.

And all the lettuces:  bibb, flame, oak leaf, butter-

crunch, black-seeded Simpson, chicory, cos.

Elizabethan ruffs, crisp verbiage.

And spinach, the dark green

of northern forests, savoyed, ruffled,

hidden folds and clefts.

And basil, sweet basil, nuzzled

by fumbling bees drunk on the sun.

And cucumbers, crisp, cool white ice

in the heart of August, month of fire.

And peas in their delicate slippers,

little green boats, a string of beads,

repeating, repeating.

And sunflowers, nodding at night,

then rising to shout hallelujah! at noon.

 

All over the garden, the whisper of leaves,

passing secrets and gossip, making assignations.

The vegetables bask in the sun,

languorous as lizards.

 

Quick, before the frost puts out

its green light, praise these vegetables,

earth's voluptuaries,

praise what comes from the dirt.

 

© Barbara Crooker

                        Radiance, (Word Press, 2005)

 

 

NOTHING DOING

 

It’s late summer, and I’m bored                

with the ten thousand shades of green,

the humidity that’s turned the air

into soup, the sun’s broiler

stuck on high . . . .  The same-

ness of the days, the stickiness

of the nights.  There are goldfinches

bobbing on the sunflowers; ho-hum,

ho-hum.  Nothing is bubbling

up from the tropics, no trouble

is brewing in the Gulf.  In Washington,

it’s the same old blah-blah-blah.  Two hawks

hang around the clouds in lazy circles;

they might be stitching shrouds

or embroidering lazy daisies; c’est

tout la même chose . . . .  Mailboxes

line up like school children,

waving their little red hands.  The war

drones on and on and on.  Paper

wasps build nests in the eaves.

I’m sitting here watching ice

cubes melt in a glass of cold tea.

I think it may take

forever.

 

© Barbara Crooker

                        New Works Review, 2007