Post by LynnDoiron on Feb 19, 2008 0:54:41 GMT -5
Mona Lisa Brown propagates
two-tone spider plants, talking
them through rebirth, through
re-becoming again a whole of
what they were cut from –
for they will grow whole
with milk white stripes slicing
green in sprouts that fling
themselves out, fountain arches
of creamery and greenery
striped and thin as shaved
curls of ice-house butter
for hotcakes of morning
and bacon time. No slim woman,
Mona Lisa, draped in black-eyed
Susan shirt and hollyhock-longlegged
pants, her gloves the buckled skin
of blisters on blisters worn tough
as acorns, knuckles smooth as those
acorn caps. She knows
the lineage of philodendrons,
not only on her kitchen sill, but also
the sills of her sisters, and the first
grade teachers of her sisters
and her sisters’ sons. She knew holes
and why they came, understood yellowing
leaves, crisped edges and mushy stems,
she knew the sadness of these
in the summer when light
was too damned bright,
in winter when wood heat dried
out the air, in spring and fall
when perfect outside made
for indoor plants not perfect
at all when forgotten unspeakable
weeks. Once, I thought her
god of green things, a wide
Demeter before seasons, her hair
the greening corn, jointed asparagus
her fingers, with feet the great
butternut squash of autumn
harvests; as we stood
with earth seeded underfoot,
I saw she was no more than me,
a woman bent about the back
and knobbed about the fingers
and greened from grass hard
kneed. She was enigmatic in bearing
as if brought from canvas into
beauteous life out of a T. Roethke poem
that had held a woman lovely
in her bones, or some poet who ate
plums, prideful in his greed. We stood
and the earth broke with shoots of
melons and tendrils curled our hems
until she checked her sunset and found
baby spiders in new loam nests
needed her watering hand, and then
the writing of Mona Lisa Brown ended,
as portraitures seeded in words
must, and her bosom heaved scattering
black-eyed Susan’s through light years,
scattering iris rhizomes through
midnight’s stellar dust.
All I could do was sign
my thanks, offer broad
sweeps to the poles, swirl them
scatter-bright in aurora borealis folds.
two-tone spider plants, talking
them through rebirth, through
re-becoming again a whole of
what they were cut from –
for they will grow whole
with milk white stripes slicing
green in sprouts that fling
themselves out, fountain arches
of creamery and greenery
striped and thin as shaved
curls of ice-house butter
for hotcakes of morning
and bacon time. No slim woman,
Mona Lisa, draped in black-eyed
Susan shirt and hollyhock-longlegged
pants, her gloves the buckled skin
of blisters on blisters worn tough
as acorns, knuckles smooth as those
acorn caps. She knows
the lineage of philodendrons,
not only on her kitchen sill, but also
the sills of her sisters, and the first
grade teachers of her sisters
and her sisters’ sons. She knew holes
and why they came, understood yellowing
leaves, crisped edges and mushy stems,
she knew the sadness of these
in the summer when light
was too damned bright,
in winter when wood heat dried
out the air, in spring and fall
when perfect outside made
for indoor plants not perfect
at all when forgotten unspeakable
weeks. Once, I thought her
god of green things, a wide
Demeter before seasons, her hair
the greening corn, jointed asparagus
her fingers, with feet the great
butternut squash of autumn
harvests; as we stood
with earth seeded underfoot,
I saw she was no more than me,
a woman bent about the back
and knobbed about the fingers
and greened from grass hard
kneed. She was enigmatic in bearing
as if brought from canvas into
beauteous life out of a T. Roethke poem
that had held a woman lovely
in her bones, or some poet who ate
plums, prideful in his greed. We stood
and the earth broke with shoots of
melons and tendrils curled our hems
until she checked her sunset and found
baby spiders in new loam nests
needed her watering hand, and then
the writing of Mona Lisa Brown ended,
as portraitures seeded in words
must, and her bosom heaved scattering
black-eyed Susan’s through light years,
scattering iris rhizomes through
midnight’s stellar dust.
All I could do was sign
my thanks, offer broad
sweeps to the poles, swirl them
scatter-bright in aurora borealis folds.
;D
