Silent Foes of Many Distances. (after Rainer Maria Rilke)

This poem was inspired by the Rilke poem, from day 2 or 3 of the daily meditations. I posted the Rilke below also for reference.

Silent Foes of Many Distances

  After Rainer Maria Rilke

Our fevered earth, wounded by UV light –

to those in charge heed this warning:

Tornadoes of fire engulf day and night

Winds of terror huff their storming.

Now, shift east to oceans out of control.

Hurricanes whip water with surge and flood,

homes and people lost, unable to console.

Darkness covers all like the lotus in mud.

Our planet convulses with what’s at stake.

Earth’s tragedies cannot go on like this,

the plates are shifting, unstable with quakes.

If earth cannot tolerate what we do,

we must bend to the brokenness of her ailing.

To those in charge: our healing is up to you.  

Annette Langlois Grunseth

by Rainer Maria Rilke

English version by Stephen Mitchell
Original Language German

Silent friend of many distances, feel
how your breath enlarges all of space.
Let your presence ring out like a bell
into the night. What feeds upon your face

grows mighty from the nourishment thus offered.
Move through transformation, out and in.
What is the deepest loss that you have suffered?
If drinking is bitter, change yourself to wine.

In this immeasurable darkness, be the power
that rounds your senses in their magic ring,
the sense of their mysterious encounter.

And if the earthly no longer knows your name,
whisper to the silent earth: I'm flowing.
To the flashing water say: I am.

Hope

Annette, there was a line in one of Heather Cox Richardson’s recent emails, a quote from a journalist, who said something about the “cratering of democracy.” It has stuck with me. I actually wrote this in response to the Day 4 prompt of the Mindful Writing Challenge, only I didn’t use the line “Don’t go off somewhere else.” Then of course the extreme cold and death crept in. I’ll be curious what you think. Did I overwork it?

I recognize the chickadees in the basket of my being.
Five or six of them in the desiccated tree of my view.
They flutter in the branches, exchanging places in a busy
skirmish, chattering about the withered berries, how cold
is a kind of helplessness, a reckoning of temperature,
seeking solution to the breaking down. The aridity is nearly
criminal. My knuckles crack in a stark topography. I am afraid
to go outside. Indoors may not be any safer. I learn of an infant
buried with the wing of a bird. The mad-capped contrast
of black and white is only for birds. Our soft bodies are gray.
The gnarling of winter leaves a streak against the sky. These
messenger birds will collaborate with other birds to survive,
a key lesson when being is in discord with living, and choices
are grim. With the hope of us cratering, we save food for later.

Refuge

My original poem was “Listen with your hands.” see 2nd photo—that’s how Peter gets inspired at Art Speaks. He uses his energy to get a sense of the painting. Carrie gives him some description and then he writes great poems! I’m on draft 12 or 15. here. My other versions were titled “Listen with your Hands” —- I rewrote this for a Raft friend (whom i also met in person a year ago) who just found out she has untreatable cancer and went home from Mayo’s right into hospice. it was such a shock. She asked for comfort so I’d like to send this to her. Coincidentally, that day, Peter & I wrote from the same painting. We have another version where Peter and I combined our lines into another poem.

Refuge

Caress the air of this indigo forest,

its chalk-shadowed trees rubbed with quiet.

Huddle up in the blue shawl of dusk

to shut out suffering.

Let shades of worry be veiled away for now.

Fibers of light-blue streak the air,

proclaim azured comfort of what is still good.

Be in this shelter of shadow.

Rest in the bluing peace of this very moment.

   +++

Since I wrote this, I learned of a sweet friend from The Raft ( we even met in person once time ) —who was JUST diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer. She was sent home to Wis. from Mayo’s last week in hospice care. I sent her this version with a card this morning. It still speaks to last week as well, I think. Thank you for your helpful comments! Margaret said the painting was untitled.

Respite for 2025

Caress the air of this indigo forest,

its chalk-shadowed trees rubbed with quiet.

Huddle up in the blue shawl of dusk

and shut out suffering.

Let shades of worry be veiled for now.

Fibers of light-blue streak the air,

proclaiming azured comfort of what is still good.

Be in this shelter of shadow.

Rest in the bluing peace of this very moment.

Baby

Annette, I wrote this in response to Day Three of the Mindful Writing Challenge, e.g. write from the “love window.”

The incubation of light and life in the middle of the night.
I attend the birth of my first grandson. The mother's mother
chooses to be on-call. My mother chuffs her dictum in my ear.
The unknowing of new mothers demands at least one sentry.
The percolating silence of the hospital, bleep bleep of the
monitors. My son offers his girlfriend ice chips and a warm
hand to clench. Trepidation defies the lavender oil and singing
bowl. The pain is manageable until it isn't. By then it's too late
for an epidural. The baby refuses to budge from the cradle
of the mother's hips. Pages and pages of a birthing plan flutter
in disappointment. It doesn't matter, I say. Only a healthy child
matters. She stares at the ceiling. Every mother tells this story.
How she succumbs to the primeval push, and decisions are out
of her control. The doctor breezes in. It's time now. We go in.

Club

Annette, here’s the prompt that prompted this poem.

From WRITE IT!

In "Ode to the Midwest," Kevin Young wrote, I want to be doused / in cheese // & fried. I want / to wander // the aisles, my heart's / supermarket stocked high // as cholesterol... I want to be // the only black person I know. Though the poem is playful, its last lines here reveal some real pain. Whether it was because of race, sexuality, gender, or some other characteristic, was there a time in which you found yourself the only one of your kind? Describe that place and experience in the most vivid detail you can recall.

Television was a two-headed beast. We couldn't agree
on who our customers were. We stood in clusters in the
four corners of a conference room, separated by experiment,
ostensibly an ice breaker. One group would rather be
homeless than pretend to be Black or female. Analysts
slouched like the moneyed and tried to explain the difference
between bull and bear markets. As if homelessness was a
choice or a deficit of will. Outside, the heat of the desert
steamed like a tongue. Inside, an antechamber coolness
breathed down my neck. My tablemates in their inky suits
thought privilege was a sign of character. The heavy chairs
snagged on the abstract misogyny of the wall-to-wall.
The glare of cufflinks gave me a headache. Never mind
the performative role play or the secret strip club handshake.

Pern del Mon

I wrote this after Drew shared a story about Sineu, Mallorca. Sineu is about 20 minutes from their village and we went there a couple of times last Oct. . We walked around the church that is mentioned here. I did more research about it when I got home. I shared this with Elisa and Drew (Also sent it to Elisa’s mother) — even though it may not be finished because the timing is right for today.: New Year’s Eve. I am hoping Elisa will. translate it into Catalan — it would be fun to submit to one of those contests or journals that want translations. (I forget—but there was one recently.). I placed commas where I thought pauses were needed. How’d I do? ;-)

Pern del Món

(“pin of the world”)

On the last day of the year

as the old year pivots,

under the bell tower

in the church,

in the town of Sineu,

on an island,

in the Mediterranean,

the calendar and the clock

calculate the passing of time

from one year into the next.

On New Year’s Eve

as the bell tolls midnight,

the world prepares to turn

to a new year.

The mayor and the priest

descend the steps in the church

to the center of the world,

to the center of time,

to oil the bolt of the world.

They turn it to the new year

to keep the world from going under

to keep us from falling away.

Cradle of Life (renamed “Symbiosis”)

I’ve been working on a poem for Elisa based on a memory of when we swam tog. at a beach in Mallorca last Oct.. I think it would fit the WFOP theme of “Pathways” for the next calendar submission.

I want to give this as a “gift poem” to Elisa at some point. I was inspired by a painting at the Miller Gallery in Sturgeon Bay at a December Art Speaks session. See attached. photo.
This poem has evolved through 4 titles, I am going with “Cradle of LIfe” for now. I’d love some feedback on it. (I’m on draft number 15 —maybe more) (btw, she wears a lap suit instead of a bikini since she is pregnant.)

Cradle of Life

         For Elisa

She sheds her clothes on the beach

slips into a black lap suit,

wades in past volcanic rock,

through papery seagrass

past patches of sand

swims arm over arm into turquoise,

finds cadence of breath,

rhythm to each pull of water

exhaling herself forward.

She carries a baby in her amniotic sea

swimming the life within,

her baby curled into itself.

In this hammock of sweet darkness

the symbiotic swimmer grows

to feel, to wake, to know.

Together they swim

from shore out past the point

into the vast sea

on a planet in the Milky Way

filled with galaxies of the Universe.

From the cosmos within

the baby travels the rhythm

of the mother who swims arm over arm

a journey toward arrival

cradled by the salt of the sea.

01/10/2025 a complete rewrite—about 25 times rewritten: for WFOP Cal. Pathways theme.

Symbiosis

         For Elisa

 She wades through papery seagrass,

over volcanic rock, and patches of sand.

She swims arm over arm into turquoise,

finds her cadence of breath,

a rhythm to each pull of water,

exhaling herself forward.

Her amniotic sea carries

a baby curled into itself.

In this hammock of sweet darkness,

her symbiotic swimmer grows

to wake, to feel, to know.

Mother with child glides

from shore out past the point

then swims back

through the rippling sea.

Like a compass the baby spins within,

the mother reaches

arm over arm, focused

on the journey toward arrival,

umbilicaled to breath,

cradled by the salt of the sea.

Fuse

Annette, I can’t seem to write anything longer than 14 lines these days, so — by default — I am working on my series of FOUR-LETTER WORDS. This poem was prompted by a WRITE IT! prompt: God is Your Shoulder // Is the bone in you / the place you didn't / grow a wing, wrote poet Molly McCully Brown in the poem "God is Your Shoulder." Whether your believe in God or not, take a deep breath and imagine part of your body is divine. Describe that holiness inside you.

Fuse

What is god but the healed clavicle collaring of
statuesque posture. You stand tall to the ache you
were born with, that existential clagging for belonging,
connection. God gives you bones to articulate like
runes, an alphabet of protrusions, bumps, grooves,
chronicling attachment, fracture, fusing of bone with
momentum. You feel for the finger bowl at the base
of your throat. God is the squared off shoulders,
the press of three fingers at the fluent hollow,
the strut of two bones on the catwalk of becoming.
God is the plush of velveteen pulse, the smooth nap
of what perceives as lovely, the high-stepping susceptibility,
the suture of windpipe and breastplate. God is the thin-
skinned vulnerability, the body notched with soul.

The Wedge

( a poem I’ve been working on for the sequel to “Becoming Trans-Parent”). I’m thinking of a positive, supportive book of poems. Anna is also writing it with me—her story will probably be written in prose.) this came from the talk we did together when Anna mentioned transgender topics have become a political wedge in our country. )

The Wedge

A political wedge splits us

with divisive rhetoric.

The tension, a rope with splitting strands

ready to snap – each side on the verge

of reeling backward

into the abyss false claims.

I see exhaustion

in your rounded shoulders

in your eyes wet with empathy.

At the end of the day

Breathe, recharge, rest.

You are good and devoted.

Replace the wedge with hope.

Be who you are.

live, and pursue happiness

like everyone else. 

Stay true to yourself.

You are always kind

always offering your hand.

Never stop.

And know that I will

always be right here with you.

Best Love,

Your Mama Bear

Be Careful of What You Wish For

A poem in response to Rebecca Meacham’s prompt #1. Should I left and right justify? Or no?

My father lost his best friend in the move from Coleman to Peshtigo, an upheaval of maybe fifteen miles. Not that he left his friend behind. The friend drowned at the swimming hole where they played hooky. My grandpa became a barber after his doctor advised him to leave construction–too much strain on his heart. Father couldn’t forget the concavity of sound as he dove into the water. They all dove, father, the friend, two buddies. The friend never surfaced. The water was green-black with treachery. Father and the buddies couldn't seem to hold their breath for the panic. Their hands didn't belong to them, fingers wrinkling maladaptively. It was all wrong—the day, the sky, the water slurping at the bank while they waited on the shore for the rescue crew to cast their trolling nets. Grandpa brought more towels than three shivering boys needed. Father shifted from foot to foot, his ink black hair gleaming in the terribleness. The bikes didn't fit in the trunk of grandpa's car. One wheel spun and spun. Barbering was easier on grandpa's clogged arteries, but the burden of standing got to him in the end. Father dreaded the black combs swimming in barbicide.

At the Center of Every Fear

I wrote htis on 11/4/24, the day befroe the eleciton. The title is the prompt line that James Crews posted on FB after his poem of the day on 11/4. Now, after the election the words still hold true for me.

At the Center of Every Fear

…there is Worry –

Fear’s snotty sibling

that pokes you awake from sleep,

then ruins a perfectly good day.

At the center of every fear

you will meet What If,

its game face competes with peace.

What If faces you head on,

hands on hips, huffing anxiety,

every whisper, a dire possibility.

At the center of every Fear

is Not Knowing,

a poker-faced chap who

holds secrets,

and hoards answers,

about the heartbeat,

the biopsy, the fever,

black ice on the road,

or shooters at schools.

Fear often hangs out in your stomach

Along with Worry, What If, and Not Knowing –

together they beat their chests,

wag their arms for your attention.

They will waste your time

with needless noise.

You have the power

to usher them out.

Grab What If’s anxiety by its breath –

take slow inhales, go deep within,

make an O with your lips

release them in a slow-motion exhale:

Not Knowing, first,

then What If.

Next, exhale Worry

and finally say goodbye to Fear.

Send them on their way,

“It’s a beautiful day

but it’s not going to get worse”

      Annette Langlois Grunseth. 11/4/2024

Seems Like My Kind of Heaven

From this summer’s-fall’s Art SPeaks I jotted random lines down that others shared from their free wirtes. I created a Cento to share on Sunday at the Art SPeaks Reading. It was FUN to do. I edited and changed some of the words to fit (revised pronouns, singulars and plurals)

Seems Like My Kind of Heaven

(A Cento from Art Speaks poets, season 2024)

In the cavern of our creation,

rub the brow of the edge,

walk against the current,

a contrast of bruising up against

chaos in order, order in chaos.

The meeting is in the moment,

the unknown beyond our kingdom,

a frigid isolation of everything

fading into sallow alleys,

wherever we’ve been bent out of shape,

backs against the cool wall —

shoulders worn by work.

Send it somewhere else,

to someone else’s bones.

Meander the stream of ashes

gentle, like ripples –

Let dreams play in our fuzzy heads,

hopelessly exhausted,

startled by the circle of white.

Allies, close, adversaries closer,

cousins of the same coin.

The scent slips in like a shadowed visitor.

Let it be not what it is, but what it should be,

this thickness of light,

a glass blown moment,

alive in our keeping,

the symmetry of our intersections,

a kind of linen gathered up in a fold

like the kindness of grandmother’s gingham.

Her fingers of light saturated with peace,

alive in our keeping.

Dance in this light of familiar space.

Born a needle with your love,

spread kindness like a shaft of sunlight.

Wow us when we are wilted,

not in labored breath

but as a howl,

a cry for life.

Today, Just Today

The next Moss Piglet, due in a few days; theme is “The Future”. I wrote this upon returning home last week learning of two deaths in the past 7 days ( along with other deaths this year that are each weighing on me.) I welcome your thoughts on this one also.

Today, Just Today

The river of memory

rushes onward

to a distant destination

pooled in my mind –

all the places I’ve been

and where I still want to go.

Oh, to stop. Here, now,

to dangle my feet

from the mossy bank of today,

red maples arched over me,

a crisp blue sky.

Let this cold water

rush over my tired feet.

Let me breathe –

breathe in

the season of now.

I want to tame

the eddy of time,

slow the swirl of it all –

the passing away

of days,

and people.

Hold the future distant

as a purpled mountain,

a horizon far away.

I am not yet ready.

Let me linger longer,

one more day,

one more week,

one more year.

Rugosa Rose

I need a poem to share from Art SPeaks from last summer for a Nov. 3 reading at Write On. I took a free write of a memory, and crafted this poem. What do you think? Is the last line too “hoky?” sentimenal? I could dorp the last line? in line 3 should I say “a bedroom window” to shorten?

Rugosa Rose

(Art Speaks, The Garden Door June 21, 2024))

Rugosa rose, magenta,

grew tall and full at the outside corner

of my brother’s bedroom window.

and the dining room.

Sun-warmed scent wafted

through the windows at dinnertime.

That rose bush grew as unruly as we kids

who ran free on summer days.

Coiled behind this gangly shrub,

we tugged the green garden hose out to the yard.

One of us squeezed behind those dense prickers

to turn the mini-wheeled faucet wide open.

Thorns caught a shirt, snagged the skin,

a gash of blood trickled down an arm,

soon red-crusted by the sun.

Water on full blast, the hose gushed into our mouths,

a faint taste of rubber with the aroma of rose

in the bloom of our youth.

Nature of Love

This was a fun prompt… I originally wrote it “my love”… and then changed to “my man” (how the Scottish talk about husbands).

From WRITE IT!
Surrealist poet André Breton wrote a list poem "Freedom of Love" that described his wife with wrists of matches...with buttocks of swans' backs... with eyes of water to be drunk in prison. Think of a beloved, or maybe just your first crush. Now describe them in a list that plays fast and loose, associating not for sense but for feeling.

After André Breton

My man with the forest walk, attuned to the whitetail, blue jay,
silk-furred mole
My man with the hush talk bounding fawn
surprise
My man with the leaf hands, veined and possible,
cascading flutter and touch, dexterous to the ax and awl
My man with the face of an otter, scritching tic swim family,
frisky whiskers
My man with the hard nut face of an acorn crosshatched cupule,
legacied and lithe
My man with the cantina eyes of blue tile stone,
skipped across the hairbreadth
My man with the scent of bark's husk musk
My man with the gasp of neck fin
My man with mowed grass amazement
My man with the hipless Lycra stretch
My man with the shoe drop utterances scattering
birds
My man with legs squared to the watertower
My man with panhandle feet
My man with the cap-wearing airlessness,
scrim stubble, uncanny canopy,
arboreal dreams

White Whale Speaks

[This is my poem for Moss Piglet, due this Wednesday— Theme: Moby Dick]

"He is, without doubt, the largest inhabitant of the globe; the most formidable of all whales to encounter; the most majestic in aspect…” – Herman Melville

White Whale Speaks

Ishmael, be aware, you are a guest in my house.

My domain spans the two-thirds of the earth that is water.

Some say I am God, mysterious,

majestic, formidable,

uncatchable.

I am the largest inhabitant of the globe.

Yet, I breathe air like you do.

We both love the sea.

Like you, I have a voice, language, and a heart.

Even if I look imposing, I seek to do no harm.

Why your vendetta? Has fate pushed you

to conquer and destroy me?

Why don’t you go after that skiff over there,

the one with the Old Man

fighting a Marlin that is longer than his boat!

Help him battle those sharks

that attack, gnaw, and consume his catch.

Go! Thrash and harpoon over there.

The Old Man’s hands are raw

and bloody, heaving on that line.

For two nights and two days

he worked that fish

and finally —

lashed it to his boat.  

He is exhausted. Spent. Drained.

He could use a crew like yours –

give him the muscle of your obsession.

For heaven’s sake,

help the Old Man

and just leave me alone.

I stopped to dig out a stone from the heel of my sandal

Weirdly this poem came from this prompt from WRITE IT:

Poet Dorianne Laux compared falling in love with accidentally being doused with gasoline while working at a gas station: Light-headed, scrubbed raw, I felt / pure and amazined--the way the amber gas glazed my flesh, the searing / subterranean pain of it, ho wmy skin / shimmered and ached, glowed / like rainbowed oil on the pavement. Try, if you can, to compare the experience of falling in love with something complete unromantic, even ugly or dangerous.

We walked across the train tracks at the end of the dead-end road on our way to the Pumphouse, a bar we all went to. The dance floor was lighted and, reliably, three young women could inspire a bartender to buy drinks—sloe gin fizzes, Tequila sunrises—whatever we were drinking that we could nurse for hours with only coins in our pockets. We were celebrating my new job at a famous deli named for its founder—Max's or Maurice's—and known for specialties like bear claw, pastrami and German potato salad.

The railroad ties split in the summer sun, the signal arm silent in the gathering gloom of a dusk that promised the Hustle and Electric Slide. I stopped to dig out a stone from the heel of my sandal. My friends waited for me on the other side of a barricade where a weed-plagued sidewalk led to Grand Avenue. A conflagration erupted across the street. We flinched at the screech of an overheating metal roof, our faces a campfire of flickering flame and shadow, glowing barrettes and make-up shimmer. The deli was on fire. A mill of pedestrians and firefighters turned away as windows exploded, glass shattering in a shower of shards. The air sizzled with smoke and fat and sugar, a skirmish of smells I still associate with catastrophe.

Endings especially got up my nose with a hair-stirring oversensitivity. The three of us wouldn't remain friends after college. I wasn't prepared for the disappointment at the potluck of their decisions. Or was it me? Smoldering with the worse kind of luck, left to walk home alone, stuck in the gesture of removing a pebble from the softness underfoot?

Safely Through Another Week

Here is my possible poem for Triad: Ekphrastic Theme. I wrote the poem, and then read the explanation. I edited some after reading it. I am glad I waited to read the explanation. I didn’t catch the guy with the booger til afterward. It could’ve been a very different poem then, ;-). “Hand picked” perhaps? HA

Safely Through Another Week”

      After the painting “Jesus Exalted in Song,” by Ben Shahn (1898-1969),  Milwaukee Museum, Narratives, page 5

The maker is in the music.

We show up Sunday, disheveled, disjointed

until we open our music.

Our chests swell with bellowed breath.

The black and white notes

on the page map the way.

The lyric is the journey,

the text crescendos to a chant

knowing there is something bigger

than squabbles.

Our voices memorize the mysterious.

The power of our parts is a chorus,

an antidote to argument.

Our music dissolves discord.

We exhale harmony.    

We sing to save our warring world.

We sing to save the children

caught in the crossfire.

We sing a shared rhythm

a collective song

a communion,

a co-existence,

a creative calm.

Singing this one moment

this one time

for all time.

 REVISION 08-06-2024

Safely Through Another Week

      After the painting “Jesus Exalted in Song,” by Ben Shahn (1898-1969), Milwaukee Museum, Narratives, page 5

The maker is in the music.

We show up Sunday morning

disheveled, disjointed

until we open our music.

Our chests swell with bellowed breath.

The black and white notes

on the page map the way.

The lyric is the journey

the text crescendos to a chant

that there is something

bigger than squabbles.

Our voices memorize the mysterious.

The power of our parts is a chorus,

an antidote to argument.

Our music dissolves discord.

We exhale harmony.    

We sing to save

our warring world.

We sing to save the children

caught in the crossfire.

We sing a collective song

a communion,

a co-existence,

a creative calm.

Singing this one moment

this one time

for all time.

Woman and Child (or High Fidelity)

Annette, this is an ekphrastic poem—hopefully for the theme category of the Triad contest. I am including the image, too.

The child wasn't real.
I moved my sleight of hand.
The slow cruise of late afternoon
chased aquamarine shadow to the paneled corners.
The photographer told me not to look at the camera.
Could I say I wished the child was mine?
Posing on the floor was a kind of art.
The child's feet broke my heart.
My left thigh was numb.
I pretended to move a piece of the puzzle.
Each piece was a tiny artifact.
My womb was a stubborn satchel.
The prop of my arm grew tired.
The photographer wooed me with the veracity question.
I was beguiled by the hand-knotting.
Already the girl practiced the downward gaze.
I had it down—
probably why the photographer
chose me.

Maja & Elodie by Sharon Lockhart, Milwaukee Art Museum

Lines Written Post-Disaster

Annette, I wrote this poem in response to prompt #1 of the Academy’s Summer Songs.

After Eduardo C. Corral

Heartbreak sings like charred meat.
The smell of heartbreak hinges doubt.
Heartbreak can't take a joke.
The heaviness of heartbreak sludges your step.
Heartbreak smokes, singeing the edges.
Heartbreak and regret are cousins.
The squawk of crows signals heartbreak.
The taste of heartbreak is licorice on your tongue.
Lilies sift a pollen of heartbreak.
Just give heartbreak a call.
Heartbreak remembers everything.
Loops of heartbreak pucker the paisley.
Heartbreak interrogates with a stiff arm.
You sputter at heartbreak, lowing the ditty.