poet garden

 

 

And it is immeasurable

the amount of moisture and damp leaf it takes,

the fluid, inexpedience.

The rivers and streams

it takes the tutelary to fill

the vainglorious spaces,

so apt as soil, so black as

crow mud, a cool place

like nightmares to rest.

 

The vicereine's naked.

The poor and lonely iris,

the bean being spun along

on tight string. The tomato

as delicate as the eye of the Indian.

Intuitive. Learned and understood.

 

I have been told that there are oceans,

which I do believe, but have never seen.

And a sky's intussusception

drawing, drawing circles in

the blue clay. Let's call it the

'poets garden'/ where one can

play and plant and pray that

the dirt is of real events

and bottom rich. That the

lotus, hugh in the Plath air,

finds peace, where no other man

has found.

 

Invite me to dinner inviolacy. My

hands dirty with a thing that wont wash off.

My tongue knowing but unclean from the

shores of Sierra Leone. I knew rice

and its rich cultivation without beasts

but no language. Just drums and

diamonds and the belly of wooden hulls.

Name me

 

since rivers are lines you cross out

and the festive Jupiter

inveigle with the still whispers

of objects minus perception, are as

Hard as the spine of the fortis of

overfed planets.

 

 

 

Reviews

[Shmoke-Sifted Heftlande..]

I have no words for the invagination of my mind that has just aspired/transpired
the ocular/oracular nature of my ear-dar has been manipulated
a meta-universe wide day of planting is occurring..the hobo-god(s) are dancing in the singularity of your validation, and the viceroy has peeled his face from the ancient gallery of a star wars film and tattoed himself on mr. mojo risin's negative-space-chest-cavity

p.s. I like cake
p.p.s. thank you dana..you are for sure amazing

[Marie Anzalone]

My ex always saw gardening as a back-breaking chore. Drove me nuts. How, I wondered, could he NOT see that each plant is a universe, that empathy for plants translates into human growth? That soil is a divine mix of nutrient and inspiration and hubris; that a tendril is a miracle of creation of evolution of willpower climbing out of darkness? The giving to, the getting back. Small catasptrophes and big rewards. A thing of beauty, worthy for its own sake. Because it exists; and it exists simply because you cultivated space for it. I do so love a hot summer night, gazing at shooting stars and Jupiter's glow, scented with stock and honeysuckle and night-blooming moonflowers, pale like hands. In a garden, one can believe that poetry does indeed come alive when we aren't looking.

[just_teague]

dana, you always inspire me. and now when I write poetry, I think of you-- as a kind of guiding vector.

[Emily B]

you will wake up one morning and find me there in your poets garden, damp with dew and cradled in birdsong

this has to be one of my favorites of your work