Nameless Storytellers

 

Nameless Storytellers

A story told and

never written, whispered in

secret, remembered.

Generations of 

women, shaping the world, one

story at a time.

GloPoWriMo Day 29

The Silent Procession

 

The Silent Procession

The orchestra couldn’t come because it was too cold.

The only music – the crunching of the snow

as the procession moved on.

That, and someone’s fitful coughing.

As if they were going to die too.

At one point, the coughing stopped.

I hope that person went somewhere warm.

After that, everything grew quiet.

Those who cried did so voicelessly.

No one wanted to disturb this pristine silence.

Surely it was more natural without music.

The snow kept falling and covered our tracks.

And soon it was 

as if nothing had happened here.

GloPoWriMo Day 28

Caller Herring

 

Caller Herring

There is a painting I once saw.

A girl sitting under a tree.

A basket of herrings by her side.

Her dreamy eyes staring into the distance.

The art critic commented on her shoes.

They were good shoes he said.

And he wondered why she stared so longingly into the distance 

with those shoes on.

And I could never decide

 what sort of shoes you should have 

to stare longingly into the distance in.

And whether there are any rules about that.

The painting is called Caller Herring.

So we know the girl was a fishwife.

She went from door to door to sell herrings.

In the meantime, she could be whoever she liked,

a princess, or a pirate, or a fish.

She could grow gills or a pair of wings.

And I wonder if the art critic would agree,

but I think those herrings are a decoy.

For no one must know that she is not a fishwife,

but someone different all together,

a pirate or a princess or a fish.

Someone with gills or a pair of wings,

ready to take off any moment now.

GloPoWriMo Day 27

Maleficent

 

Maleficent 

I have never liked children.

They walk in here, clumsy and loud,

their fat fingers all over my work.

This girl was no exception.

She wanted me to teach her how to spin,

as if I was willing to share my secrets with any stranger.

She had no talent for art.

She was beautiful, even I could see that,

but not very smart.

Spoiled little brat, used to having it her way.

She should have kept her little fingers to herself

and then we wouldn’t be in this mess.

Everybody blames me now, but how is this my fault?

How was I to know that she would go straight for the needle?

Yes, it is true. I know nothing about children.

I never had or wanted any myself.

My art is all that matters to me.

GloPoWriMo Day 26

A Piano Concert

 

A Piano Concert

I dreamt of my friend again last night.

In my dream, she was playing Bach,

Wearing a white dress, black shoes

and a large blue ribbon in her hair.

In my dream she was 12 again.

In my dream she played flawlessly, 

as she always had.

This time around, I don’t let her skill distract me.

This time around, I know better.

So I watch her face and realise,

with my adult brain,

that she is terrified.

She is biting her lip, nervously.

Her body is rigid on that chair.

And then, here it is.

A tiny mistake.

She stops, briefly, takes a sharp breath,

then quickly continues, beautifully,

like a true pro.

But it is too late now.

I see her father get up from his chair.

and our piano teacher sees him too.

She steps in and tries

to position her pregnant body

between my friend and the audience.

Her arms are spread and with her hands

she is trying to hold the room steady

as it starts to move and shake.

And in my dream, I wonder what she knows

as my friend continues playing

faster and faster,

And suddenly we are on a merry-go-round

as the room starts spinning,

and everything becomes a blur.  

GloPoWriMo Day 25

Let me sell this pen to you

 

Let me sell this pen to you

This pen rebelled against me.

This pen spoke filthy words.

This pen could speak.

This pen cheated on me.

This pen never said it was sorry.

This pen played tricks on me.

I was tricked into using this pen.

I fed this pen my blood.

This pen spilled my secrets.

GloPoWriMo Day 24

A Duet of Owls

 

A Duet of Owls

There might be birds with a song sweeter than theirs. 

Some say they sing out of tune.

Still, only her call can help him find his way home.

And only his lullaby can dispel the fear of daytime.

GloPoWriMo Day 23

Ikebana Lessons

 

Ikebana Lessons

When I was a child, I attended ikebana lessons. I have forgotten most of what I learnt there. I remember how we posed for the local newspaper. I have my flower arrangement right there in the photo, frozen in time, the way real flowers can never be. Our teacher used to say there’s beauty in imperfection, that I remember. She tried to teach us how to remove anything that was unnecessary from our arrangement. That was a hard lesson for us to learn. I remember how just three flowers can tell a story. The tallest one is your subject, the middle one is the object. I don’t remember the name of the shortest flower. I have never been much good at gardening. Yet, I admire flowers and how they grow, imperfectly and simply, how they arrange themselves effortlessly into a story each time. 

The tallest flower

is the subject. The other

two tell the story.

GloPoWriMo Day 22

How to Write a Poem

 

How to Write a Poem

This is easy.

Go into the woods and get lost there.

Find yourself a tall tree.

Observe its roots and the unevenness of its bark.

Hear the flapping of invisible wings in its crown.

Do not try to see the bird.

Do not attempt to identify its call

Or search for it in encyclopedias.

Then sit next to the tree and lean against its branch.

Allow yourself to fall asleep.

Do not try to remember your dream.

Even if you succeed, the dream will mean nothing.

It will not point to any wisdom.

When you come back home, write a single word in your notebook.

Let the word be important.

Then nothing.

Repeat this for a year.

Each day, get lost in the woods.

Then find a tree.

Let it be a different tree each day.

Wait for the bird to come.

It will be a different bird each day.

Take a nap.

Get back home, then write a word in your notebook.

After a year has passed, you will have a lot of words there.

Light a fire, then proceed to burn the notebook.

Now you’ll be on your own.

Sit down and write your poem.

That’s it.

GloPoWriMo Day 21

Tree of Stories

 

Tree of Stories

Once upon a time in a kingdom of old

there was a hidden garden and inside 

a tree of stories grew.

Each piece of fruit a fairy tale,

a dream come true, a piece of magic,

a promise made.

If only I could find that garden,

if I could see that tree of stories,

 I would sit and watch the fruit

as it grows.

Each piece of fruit a fairy tale,

a dream come true, a piece of magic,

a promise made.

Once upon a time there was a dark cavern

And inside it there sat a spinner.

She spun her yarn of dreams and stories,

of treasures lost and treasures found

And those who came to her at night

would sit across from her and wait

as she revealed her magic yarn

just for them.

If only I could find that spinner,

if only I could stay and watch

as she spins her yarn of dreams 

of treasures lost and treasures found,

as she reveales her magic yarn

just for me.

GloPoWriMo Day 20

Protection

 

Protection

Her husband had an old gun that he kept in the bottom drawer. He showed it to her the day they got married. In case she needed to protect herself when he was away, the gun was right there, he said. He even taught her how to shoot. They practiced in the back yard. She found it scary, but she did her best to learn, because you never knew when you might need protection. He was often away and at first she found it hard to be separated from him. He was the love of her life. He was also the reason why she didn’t speak to her family, but he was worth it, she thought. She had been only 15 when she had ran away with him. So, now they were alone in this little town, and he was the only person she knew here. She didn’t mind, he was her whole world. He was often away and soon she learnt to cherish these times of solitude, when there was no one in the little house and when the shadows on the walls became long. Every time he went away, he would lock her in, for her own protection. Before leaving, he always told her to use the gun if she heard someone at the door. So, was it her fault that she did as he’d told her? Because someone was at the door. And how was she to know that it was him? 

GloPoWriMo Day 19

My Friend the Wind

 

My Friend the Wind

There was that one summer we decided to travel through Europe.

I don’t remember how old I was, but I was still a child.

We would start before dawn to avoid the heat.

Everywhere we went, it smelt like burnt asphalt.

My father drove our old Renault 4.

I mostly slept on the back seat.

My mother was in charge of the music.

She played cassettes on our white Hitachi.

My parents had bought it before the trip.

They were proud of it.

Look at how small it is, they would say.

Look at how cute it is.

My mom played the music my dad liked.

He was the driver, after all.

My Friend the Wind was on repeat.

My dad sang along, although he spoke no English.

He even danced a little in his seat.

It kept him awake, my mother said.

My mother kept playing the tapes without pause.

She was always afraid that he could fall asleep.

She fed him sandwiches and he ate them from her hand.

She made him stop often and drink some coffee

We had a red thermos with large white polka dots.

There was that one night we slept in the car, 

as all hotels were full.

It was in Italy, I believe.

My mother held vigil the whole night.

I remember I awoke to a blue sky

And the sound of the sea by the side of the road.

We saw a lot of beautiful places that summer,

But I remember that morning best of all.

GloPoWriMo Day 18

The Witch

 

The Witch

And have I told you about my mother’s best friend?

There were rumours that she was a witch.

I wouldn’t know.

I just remember that she was really good with tarot.

She always told you what you wanted to hear,

so, of course, you would wave it off

as too good to be true.

But then sometimes it would happen the way she’d predicted.

Not always, though, but sometimes was enough.

You can’t have good things happening to you all the time.

She baked the best chocolate cake and

I guess you could say it was bewitching,

but in a good way.

And there was that one time she convinced my parents 

not to go to the cinema,

but to stay in with her,

and she was baking those divine cheese rolls.

And it smelled so good at her place that my parents decided to stay.

And they had a great time, but still felt a little sorry about the cinema.

And then the next day they heard there had been a bomb at the cinema

and no one had survived.

Later she claimed that she’d simply wanted them to stay

and there was nothing more to that.

Yet, that one time I’d almost died, I’d dreamt of her the night before.

And she was already dead back then.

“Don’t come in here!” she said and I didn’t.

She didn’t want me to join her, well not yet, anyway.

And I didn’t.

Maybe that was a coincidence too, I don’t know.

So, I honestly don’t know if she was a witch or not.

I guess she could have been, after all.

GloPoWriMo Day 17

As the orchestra plays Tchaikovsky and Shor

 

As the orchestra plays Tchaikovsky and Shor

My meadow sleeps,

floating over a lazy subterranean river.

At midnight, the fairies dance

a suite from Nutcracker 

They wake the river up. 

It surfaces in a gracious crescendo

It spreads its long arms and

hugs my meadow.

The fairies wade happily through the water.

The full moon hangs low over my meadow

as the orchestra starts playing Shor

and the fairies hang their clothes onto trees to dry.

GloPoWriMo Day 16

Arrival

 

Arrival

On top of a hill

my house sleeps.

Wild mint, yarrow and basil

whisper in the wind.

Robins and larks sing its praise.

My key in the lock.

GloPoWriMo Day 15

Coatimundis

 

Coatimundis

I wish I could get adopted 

by a pack of coatimundis.

They would teach me how to hunt,

their tails upturned in the tall grass

like a beacon for me to find my way home.

They would cackle like a flock of mad birds

to see me come back from a hunt with nothing again.

They would stomp their little feet as they circle around me,

creaking like rusty chains in their happiness to see me

Like a car with a burnt exhaust valve they would growl 

at my clumsiness and my inability to learn.

I am sure they would kindly let me sleep with them,

nuzzling me with their long snouts,

beeping in my ear

like a pack of angry foghorns

on an especially foggy night.

GloPoWriMo Day 14

A Pea Hen’s Lament

 

A Pea Hen’s Lament

Does it look to you like I am happy?

I didn’t choose these feathers or these wings.

Bewitched into this form in my dream one night,

I have no appetite for human food or the joy it brings.

All I really care for are those apples.

Up in the tree I hide and eat those apples.

GloPoWriMo Day 13 - Donald Justice's form

This poem is a part of a longer project

The Nine Pea Hens and the Golden Apples

 

The Nine Pea Hens and the Golden Apples

Part 1

He fell asleep in his back yard under a barren apple tree.

At midnight, the garden was alight

as if at dawn.

And then he saw the tree had borne fruit of pure gold.

Next, he saw a flock of peacocks in the tree,

devouring the apples.

And then he saw a pea hen land in front of him.

She unzipped her plumes and took them off, 

as if they had been a tight dress.

Underneath them was a woman of rare beauty.

In the morning she was gone, and so were the apples.

No one believed him.

The following night it happened all over again.

This time, he stole a lock of her hair, to prove his story.

She looked at him with sadness in her eyes,

then turned into a bird again and flew away,

never to return.

And so he searched for her day and night,

And so he asked around, and people told him

that once upon a time there’d been an exiled queen

turned into a peacock by an evil wizard,

bewitched to roam the world with her sisters,

until the power of true love shall set her free. 

GloPoWriMo Day 12

Based on this fairy tale

Hydrangeas

 

Hydrangeas

And did I tell you about my other grandmother,

the one who lived in the country,

weaved her own carpets,

and knew how to cast a spell?

I am sure I did.

Anyway, she had a garden,

messy and beautiful in a wild way,

just like she was.

There were apples there

and wild strawberries

and sweet pears,

But mostly there were flowers.

I remember those blue flowers,

later I learnt they were hydrangeas,

but back then they were just blue flowers to me.

I was a child, you understand.

I would pretend I was lost in this garden.

I was a princess, or a fairy.

Anyway, those hydrangea bushes were beautiful.

They were big and I was small, and I could hide behind them.

But mostly I sat on the ground and just looked at them.

Later we sold that house and that garden and my grandmother came to live with us.

In our city home, she somehow became ordinary.

I remember she cried a lot when she thought nobody could see her.

I wonder what had happened to those hydrangea bushes.

I saw my grandmother cast a spell with my own eyes.

She had good intentions, though.

I was ill and she wanted me to stop hurting.

The spell failed, but I never told her.

A few years later she died.

I never went to see the place where she had lived.

I was afraid I wouldn’t recognize the garden.

Maybe it too had become ordinary by then.

GloPoWriMo Day 11

Let’s talk about beautiful things

 

Let’s talk about beautiful things

Let’s talk about beautiful things,

like butterflies, ladybirds and shells.

Let’s look up words of mellifluous sound,

like lullabies, arias and bells.

Let’s cook up some peppery words,

like fiery, piquant and sharp.

Let’s add to those some sonorous words,

like thunderstorm, clamorous and thump. 

And let’s mix in some pleasing words,

like agreeable and delicious and swell.

To finish this list, 

some magical words,

such as amulet, enchantment and spell.

GloPoWriMo Day 10

2 o’clock in the morning

 

2 o’clock in the morning

Everything sleeps.

It is just me and this computer on my lap.

Letter f is jammed. I need to hit it hard,

My bloodstream buzzes soothingly in my ears.

The old clock ticks.

It always does.

And then the sounds of

computers, fridges, washing machines.

They never sleep either.

Somebody’s sewing machine.

And then, the growling,

deep and,ominous.

Fighting against the demons of his past,

the neighbour’s dog, telling the world,

to leave him alone, once and for all.

To let him rest.

GloPoWriMo Day 9

Hour after Hour

 

Hour after Hour

There goes my life, little by little,

There goes a year, a day, an hour.

And nothing changes, and all’s the same,

As the clock strikes hour after hour.

And here I wait, don’t know for what,

And here it slips, another hour.

And further on along the road,

I stop to rest, there goes an hour.

And here I run to chase my dreams

And here I lose them, there slips an hour.

And now I stare at the clock and wait

I see it pass, another hour.

There goes my life, little by little,

There goes my life, hour after hour.

GloPoWriMo Day 8 - a ghazal

I am not a work of historical fiction

 

I’m not a work of historical fiction

My life, a haiku.

A moment of stillness. My

bare feet on the floor.

GloPoWriMo Day 7

Honey

Honey

Its sizzly hug,

Its sibilants all buzzy,

Like velvet on your tongue.

Its taste all fuzzy.

Smoldering is its home of gold,

its inhabitants enraged.

Human or bear,

if you dare,

disturb their bed,

beware,

or you may end up with a sore head.

GloPoWriMo Day 6

 

The sound of old furniture at three o’clock in the morning

 

The sound of old furniture at three o’clock in the morning

The clock clears its throat.

It pauses dramatically.

Then, with a hint of frenzy,

it sets the tempo of a waltz,

Then grows silent.

Drip, drip, drip goes the tap, 

smugly saying ‘yeah, I’m better than you‘.

Others take over,

a choir of crazy things,

unoiled, unhinged.

They play their outlaw country classic,

with some improvisatory screaming thrown in. 

Someone rattles a rusty chain.

It is the clock again.

The time is three thirty.

Suddenly, the joy is gone.

The music fades out.

Silence falls

The party is over.

NaPoWriMo Day 5

Of shipwrecks, safe havens and wings

 

Of shipwrecks, safe havens and wings

I am not sure what the painting represents.

Maybe a shipwreck.

Or a day in the life of a seagull.

Or maybe those two rocks symbolize something.

When I was little, 

I thought it was about Robinson Crusoe.

His ship was wrecked on a day like this one.

Look, these are the rocks he held onto.

And this is the island where he later lived.

When I was small, I wanted to live inside it too.

Maybe there were mermaids and underworlds.

Or I could be a mermaid myself, or a gull.

Everything’s possible inside a painting like this one.

I could tell you more about

what I was like as a child.

Or I could tell you about the painter,

a refugee from Russia after the Revolution.

Or I could tell you about my grandmother.

This painting had been her dowry.

Later she carried it wherever she moved.

Until she came to live with us

and the canvas found its place on this wall,

where it still lives.

I guess I could tell you more about her life,

or that of the painter, or mine.

Or I could continue this metaphor

of shipwrecks, safe havens and wings,

Or I could admit that I am not sure exactly

where I am going with all this.

GloPoWriMo Day 4

I am sure the neighbours appreciate me as a poet

 

I am sure the neighbours appreciate me as a poet

While the neighbours sleep like babies,

I am here breaking the furniture

I am here singing at the top of my voice,

and I don’t even apologise in the morning.

While the neighbours suspect nothing,

I am busy plucking all their roses,

I am busy planting meat-eaters in their place

and strange little bushes that don’t have a name.

While the neighbours keep going on about

what an angel I am,

I am plotting bloody murder on their porch,

I am dancing in the moonlight with a pair of tigers,

and still I don’t say I’m sorry.

GloPoWriMo Day 3

You know who you are

 

By Klügmann Painter - Jastrow (2006), Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=668158

You know who you are

You give me riddles and pointless little trials.

You must be bored.

I tried to stay away from you,

but you keep singing out of tune,

you keep growling at me through clenched teeth,

and when I ask what you want

you pretend to be asleep.

Then you make me wake up at night,

you offer me simile as lame

as yesterday’s first drafts,

metaphors as pointless,

as they are stale.

You don’t follow rules you say,  

yet you keep dancing around the truth,

you wear this shield of platitudes,

and you hide your face in shadows.

GloPoWriMo Day 2

How Mona Lisa was painted

 

How Mona Lisa was painted

He painted her on a base of red-brown ochre.

He dressed her in iron oxide and vegetable browns.

The colours of her chest were those of red ground and bone black

The hue on her skin was lead white and Flanders yellow.

The shadows on her face – burnt amber and black ink.

GloPoWriMo Day 1

I used the following resource