A lesson

they give each other roses

The Photography of  Mark Sink

I Am Vertical

"But I would rather be horizontal.
I am not a tree with my root in the soil
Sucking up minerals and motherly love
So that each March I may gleam into leaf,
Nor am I the beauty of a garden bed
Attracting my share of Ahs and spectacularly painted,
Unknowing I must soon unpetal.
Compared with me, a tree is immortal
And a flower-head not tall, but more startling,
And I want the one's longevity and the other's daring.

Tonight, in the infinitesimallight of the stars,
The trees and the flowers have been strewing their cool odors.
I walk among them, but none of them are noticing.
Sometimes I think that when I am sleeping
I must most perfectly resemble them--
Thoughts gone dim.
It is more natural to me, lying down.
Then the sky and I are in open conversation,
And I shall be useful when I lie down finally:
Then the trees may touch me for once, and the flowers have time for me."

by Sylvia Plath

“In A New York Minute” by Roger Guetta

“In A New York Minute” by Roger Guetta

(9/11 Tribute)

In a heartbeat, we entered the realm of the melancholy,

In a wink of an eye, we found ourselves at the edge of the abyss,

In a sneaking suspicion, we uttered true lies.

In a moment in time, we lost our balance,

In a glimmer of hope, we were swept away,

In a last gasp, we grew weary,

In a lasting desire, we lay naked,

In a sequence of events, we lost our rhythm,

In making due, we compromised our dignity,

In a New York minute, we faced unspeakable truths,

In a split second, we accommodated a solemn thought,

In a broken promise, we understood our fragility,

In a slim chance, we rolled snake eyes,

In a forced grin, we encountered our double,

In a double take, we fixated our eyes on the sublime,

In a round about way, we made peace with ourselves,

In a false step, we heard ourselves falter,

In dire straights, we rebounded to live another day,

In resisting temptation, we became God’s savior,

In seizing the moment, we set the record straight,

In tempting fate, we lagged behind the running pack,

In tuning in, we arrested our development,

In twisting the truth, we fell prey to untold misery,

In breaking new ground, we lost our footing,

In flirting with disaster, we landed on our asses,

In a solemn oath, we deceived our own shadows,

In the eye of the storm, we captured our enigmatic spirits,

but lost them again during the calming,

In the depths of despair, we muscled our way to the front of the line,

In a stroke of luck, we lived the moment,

In a silent prayer, we forced a smile,

In a lingering thought, we assumed the position,

and didn’t dare lift a finger

In calculating our every move, we faced our shortcomings,

In sensing danger, we reached in our pockets and made no sudden moves,

In embracing religion, we became zealots,

In rejecting religion, we became careful,

In acts of generosity, we let things slide,

we let them slip,

we let them sail,

never asking anything in return,

In fine form, we insulted a humble soul.

The humble soul remains us.

Poem & Photo by Roger Guetta

Quebec/Canada

courtesy of the The Juice Bar

Jessica Silversaga - Photographer

"september is a month like any other and unlike any other. it seems in september everything awaited will arrive: in the calm air, in a particular scent, in the stillness of the quay. when september comes, i know i’m going to lose myself.". -- From 'memory of water' by Reina María Rodriguez.

the last days of summer

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imprints 2009

Books & Lovers

Thanks to Karine

a poem

This Was Once a Love Poem


by Jane Hirshfield

This was once a love poem,
before its haunches thickened, its breath grew short,
before it found itself sitting,
perplexed and a little embarrassed,
on the fender of a parked car,
while many people passed by without turning their heads.

It remembers itself dressing as if for a great engagement.
It remembers choosing these shoes,
this scarf or tie.

Once, it drank beer for breakfast,
drifted its feet
in a river side by side with the feet of another.

Once it pretended shyness, then grew truly shy,
dropping its head so the hair would fall forward,
so the eyes would not be seen.

IT spoke with passion of history, of art.
It was lovely then, this poem.
Under its chin, no fold of skin softened.
Behind the knees, no pad of yellow fat.
What it knew in the morning it still believed at nightfall.
An unconjured confidence lifted its eyebrows, its cheeks.

The longing has not diminished.
Still it understands. It is time to consider a cat,
the cultivation of African violets or flowering cactus.

Yes, it decides:
Many miniature cacti, in blue and red painted pots.
When it finds itself disquieted
by the pure and unfamiliar silence of its new life,
it will touch them—one, then another—
with a single finger outstretched like a tiny flame.

PRECIPICE

"The border
of a thing.

Its edge
or hem.

The selvage,
the skirt,

a perimeter’s
trim.

The blow
of daylight’s

end and
nighttime’s

beginning.

A fence

or a rim,
a margin,

a fringe.
And this:

the grim,
stingy

doorstep
where

the lapse
of passage

happens.
That slim

lip of land,
the liminal

verge
that slips

you past
your brink.

Where
and when

you
blink."

© 2011, Jill Alexander Essbaum
From: Poetry, Vol. 197, No. 4, January, 2011