Baking
Foolish. Fearless
In discussion heshe often
grabs hold an idea
& dumps itki into the mix
First thought. Best guess
Only upon reflection
just as often backtracks
Flips the dial
Listens to wise women
The menus of smart men
Open as any expert
to the brilliant divergent
messiness of mistakes
essential to
success
Chaff
to winnow
Shell to yolk
To make a better
bread
Telluride Science
-for Sara
The air is wild with leaves
as gusts announce an early fall storm
Beyond the Valley Floor
lightnings’ silver filigrees thread
the darkening western weave
of massed West End nimbostratus
We sip libations to toast
& celebrate the latest re-do
of the Rio Grande Southern depot
into a center of cutting edge science
Telluride’s
untracked tourist-plus locomotive
charging full-STEM ahead
into a fact-based lane-changing
interstellar panarchtopia
Original Thinkers Hosts Big Ideas
Essential
—for Art Goodtimes
When I was clay,
was mud, was
slurry, was sludge,
he said, Fly,
beautiful bird,
high and low.
When I was
nothing, he said,
I am honored
to be your friend.
When there was
nothing to be said,
he sat with me.
We breathed in
deep sadness.
We breathed out love.
All around us,
the grass grew.
Inside, I felt it,
as if his words
were prophecy,
I knew it,
the possibility
of wings.
-Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer
Photo by Wendy Videlock
Ed Werner's Off the Wall Sculpture Show
OFF THE WALL ... Ed Werner was one of the first folks I met in Telluride. In fact, I held my first poetry reading in Telluride while house-sitting his and Lisa's rental in town on North Spruce Street. And later the old Telluride Writer's Guild put on a gala poetry event in Fall Creek at his home there ...
But he moved to Ridgway when he and Lisa split up and has been living there for the last couple decades ... His sculptures have always been challenging pieces -- well made but full of irony and sometimes dark energies...
His recent show at the Trace Gallery in Ridgway was no different. Less new pieces and more things he's pulled from his collection of pieces he's had in storage for many years. But nevertheless impressive.
I've always loved his work for his critique of American culture and his precision fabrication skills. For many years he did fine carpentry in Telluride and the region from his workshop in Fall Creek. More photos from his show appear at the end of this column.
CHILE VOTES NO ... Itki was a sad day for progressives in Chile as the country overwhelmingly voted down a new Constitution to replace the one crafted by the dictator Gen. Pinochet and, unfortunately, still now in effect after this election. Read what the Guardian of Britain had to say about itki HERE.
QUOTABLE ... "My favorite definition of poetry has always been from Ezra Pound: 'language charged with meaning.' slightly repurposed from ABC of Reading; packing twice, maybe ten times as much into as many words as the party smalltalk line. A poet might use tropes and allusions to accomplish this, but ultimately the most powerful tool they can use is the musical sound of the words themselves" ... By Colorado poet Uche Ogbuji, from his newsletter, Loomiverse
TALKING GOURD ... Found this lovely poem online at Silver Birch Press’s “How To Heal the Earth” series. Mistakes are how we learn and Mary McCarthy does both in a most moving way. We had a passionflower vine at one of the houses I lived at as a youth. It is a stunningly beautiful plant. Find out more about Silver Birch Press HERE.
 |
| Gulf Fritillary on Passionflowers (Photo by Gwillhickers). |
MY MISTAKE
When an army of hungry
orange and black caterpillars
stripped bare half
my passion flower vine
almost overnight
I saw nothing but
their ravenous appetite
their warning armor
of black spikes.
I pulled them off
one by one
the way I would pluck
big green hornworms
from my tomato plants,
and crush them with
a booted foot.
Too late I learned
these were the larva
of the Gulf Fritillary
butterfly, a beauty,
and passion flower vine
not merely its favorite
but its only host.
How could I refuse them
their necessary food
after planting milkweed
for the monarchs,
shunning pesticides
and fertilizers,
learning to love
those humble plants
whose virtues go unnoticed
because they are not showy?
I had no excuse
for extermination,
doubly wrong
because even this hungry army
can only curb, not end
the rampant growth
of its chosen host
limiting its kudzu ambitions
enough to allow recovery–
While my murderous efficiency
could upset the essential
balance, worm and vine,
lives so absolutely
intertwined.
Mary McCarthy is a retired Registered Nurse who has always been a writer. Her work has appeared in many journals and anthologies, most recently in The Plague Papers, edited by Robbi Nester, The Ekphrastic World, edited by Lorette Luzajic, the latest issue of Earth’s Daughters and Third Wednesday. She has been a Best of the Net and a Pushcart nominee. Her digital chapbook is available as a free download from Praxis magazine.
 |
| Meredith Nemirov facing camera and her artist partner Jorge Roberto Anchondo on the far right were among the many attendees at the Trace Gallery for Ed Werner's show during Ridgway's First Friday Art Walk. |
MASKS
No one in Norwood, even in the clinic
(except the dentist & her whitecoats)
still wear masks, though probably itki’d be
safer if we all did that, but God forbid!
We’re mask-weary Americans, hardly be-
leaving the other end of the titter-tottering
urban bread & rural water. But ready to be
at least normal again, as if we ever could
be wise be wary be aware or not to wear the
questions that come tumbling down, circling
round & flooding our cautions. Thinking the Herd
Elections. Abortions. Nothing to hide us from
eye to eye, facing off
with each odd other
____________________________________________________________________________________
