http://chanceoperationsstl.blogspot.com/
I bought a book by Drucilla Wall, and I already love it!! The Geese at the Gates! She invokes the genie locii of every place she visits- a true Shameness!!!!
Also hear a wonderful Frenchman expatriate, Marcel Toussaint. Loved his poem about the lady driving the red car, and collecting speeding tickets!
The first poem I read was The Magi, by T.S. Eliot. I gave "quite a different reading of it, than as is usual" and I knew where I was going with it, and "it was very good to hear it new," was the verdict.
And that is good because I love T.S. Eliot a lot, and in a way I cannot describe, short of loving him the way I love the colour green, or Venus shining in the twilight. And when I read something great I want to be worthy of it, of course.
Moreover, along with all the other spirits- and right now it is every spirit that ever walked the earth!- T.S. Eliot is here and roaming the poeted and poetic haunts of his old home town. So it was wonderful to read some of his poetry so near to his birthplace.
And the poem, The Magi, is fitting for this period in history, when those of us that are shifting into the New Age, are indeed "no longer at ease here, in the old dispensations" and the "alien gods" are being clung to fiercely.
I also read Los Angeles poet, writer, and editor, Marie Lecrivain. I read her great poem "Manifesto of a Sexy Librarian" last time I was there. Tonight I read one of her latest poems "Shamanic Dreams Via The Internet And Prolonged RNC Coverage".
I also read my own poem. It takes me a long time to finish a poem.
Edit: This was originally written just after Katrina and dedicated to the annual Red Dress Run in New Orleans (which actually occurs in Spring.) This is a poem that seems born (or bourne) by hurricanes. I finished this and read it on October 29, 2012, as Hurricane Sandy was arriving in New York City.
EDIT EDIT: This poem, however, is NOT about hurricane Katrina or any other hurricane. It is about both the season of Autumn in nature, Samhain, and also about women's bodies, if nature and the four seasons were the same woman.
AUTUMN
WEARS A RED DRESS
Autumn
comes gaily clad,
Cooling
the skin, but enflaming the eye;
She
is the raucous harbinger of
Winter’s
silent and unprotesting
Final
death; the immodest,
Elderly
grey,
Corpse
to be concealed
Reverently
beneath
Modest,
white morgue sheets
Of
snow and ice.
Autumn,
she comes,
Crying
and wailing;
Beating
her chest,
Exposing
her distress;
She
can not be consoled,
Until
that tantamont tango,
Naked
and whole,
At
last.
From
the Debutante Spring
That
grew like a wallflower;
Danced
bare-legged and
Gawky
limbed;
Rode
her Papa's toes
Like
an awkward colt.
Through
to Summer ,
A
Fine and Generous Lady
Ample
bosomed,
Carnal
and knowing,
Her
skirts full and lush,
Fertile
and green;
Her suitors, potent;
Her suitors, potent;
Her
children, many.
Comes
Autumn, then, finally,
Liberated
from decorum and duty,
By
the windsong echo of
Death-bone
rattling drumbeats
Of
thanks and praise;
Blessings.
Autumn
hosts a feast! A party!
A
festive Crescent City Wake,
Held
just before the
Last
rites will be given.
Autumn
dons her gayest dress;
Flaunts
her harlot fashions,
Taunting
like a Hollywood starlet
The
phantom that approaches
To
claim her last dance.
Bare
legged again,
But
veined now, and thinner skinned;
Shedding
her accessories
Coyly,
one by one,
She
boldly leads
Mourners
dressed in riotous color;
And
Dixieland bands,
Trumpets
gleaming, toot sweet,
Through
dream-soaked streets,
Announcing
The
Year’s last breath.
Dressed
in bold finery,
With
nothing to celebrate
But
certain death,
The
Old Year is carried jubilantly
On
the shoulders of the parade
To
the Midnight of the Seasons.
On
this Eve
The
pyre is lit;
The
uninvited and the dead
Feast
with the living;
And
the soul of
The
unborn New Year
Runs
mad with prophecy
And
redemption in the streets.
The
Old Year's breathe rattles
Like
kindling,
And
under a sickle moon sky
She
lays to rest
Upon the dead wood crackling orange
Against the smokey black night.
Upon the dead wood crackling orange
Against the smokey black night.
And
Autumn wears a red dress
To
the funeral.
Copyright
2005 and 2012
EDIT: You can hear me read all three of these: http://laladyrae.blogspot.com/2012/10/my-readings-of-poems-from-29-oct-2012.html
EDIT: You can hear me read all three of these: http://laladyrae.blogspot.com/2012/10/my-readings-of-poems-from-29-oct-2012.html
