Snow White, The Sleeping Earth
by Stardustraven
Before she would wake up
Mother Earth
Had made an appointment
With Snow White
She blew
Her whiteness
Whirled,
Twirled,
Danced,
Descended.
The Willow bent down
To admire our Lady's loveliness.
She almost toppled and fell.
On an icy isle ducks slept,
Heads bent over their feathers.
In some gardens,
Blackbirds searched quietly for food
Hidden by darkness,
A loon called
To his companions
Regally the Planes
Towered above all,
Keeping a watch with Poplars
Over a tender mother
Barely awake, she blew
Another frosty kiss at her denizens.
Yawning sleepily, she blinked,
Her eyes shut
She was still
I dreamed with her
stardustraven 2003-2005
Bio: Stardustraven lives and works in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. She has worked at the University Library of Amsterdam, where she worked partially for the Rare and Early Printings Project, and she now works at the Municipal Archive. Four of her poems were published at Poetic Medicine, Troubadour21, The Shofar Literary Review and NatureWriting.com.
Solitaire
by Gerald Solomon
This early blizzard we all expected —
down on dizzy shops and the tourist lake.
The mountains are fading — Langdales, Crinkle Crags,
tamed by a name and spot-height on the map.
Climbers come here to buy special gear.
In this empty house, solitaire on the piano.
(Somewhat shamed by a sly idea:
power of Being, if someone else should overhear.)
To look up now from this granite village:
up there, rocky knolls, granite scars, quartz.
Down here on the valley floor a few cows still.
Familiar hills too easily estranged.
Now blown snow passing by, settles on
our boundary, dark green yews.
(A Christmas card once you drop your guard.)
My window outstares everything.
A ragged crow flopping down the street for road-kill.
Behind this modern house, in the deep dark ghyll,
our waterfall's in spate, snow falling on waters falling...
Bio: Born in London, MA at Cambridge, first worked as producer at the BBC, then moved on to Middlesex University to teach the poetry courses. Married with four children, came to live in New York, working as an artist-painter. British and American citizen.
Days of Dormancy
by Catherine McGuire
The winter sun lays gently
on the cold concrete, touches the glass
of the door, enters, hesitant, onto the rug
and the couch where I sit,
cold as any waiting bulb, torn
between an urge to push up, to break free,
and fear of winter’s cruelty and
the cold, cold ground that holds me.
Not-yet-spring, the days before Imbolc,
are red-tipped with hope, quiet and still as frozen
ponds, the would-be poised as far out
as it dares, trying to sense the time,
the welcoming moment.
What has sprung from the compost
of my heart lies still for now,
but its tip trembles with anticipation.
I will bloom
BIO: Catherine McGuire has had more than 200 poems published in venues such as: Adagio, Folio, Fireweed, Gray Sparrow Press, Green Fuse, New Verse News, Nibble, Portland Lights Anthology, The Quizzical Chair anthology, The Smoking Poet, and Tapjoe. Her chapbook, Palimpsests, will be released by Uttered Chaos in 2011. She is webmaster for the Oregon Poetry Society and has two self-published chapbooks. Her website is www.cathymcguire.com.
Desires Lines
by Peter D. Goodwin
Several days after the snowfall
it had warmed, melted a little
and froze again, the path through
the woods slippery and treacherous
yet nearby where no heavy
footsteps had crushed the snow
gentle paths beckoned
animal trails, natural trails
the warm earth absorbing
the frozen moisture, revealing
lines of desire
a gentle indentation
a subtle invitation
away from treacherous ice through
an unmarred landscape along its slopes,
bumps and dips, gliding under tall trees,
around thorned bushes, over fallen logs,
skirting clearings, turning in unexpected
ways, opening the land to new eyes
an excursion that had started as an escape
from winter confinement, a heavy heart
inside a stale interior atmosphere
becomes a joyful liberation
boots and soul
light and loving.
Bio:Peter D. Goodwin divides his time between the streets and vibrant clutter of New York City. and the remnants of the natural world along Maryland Chesapeake Bay. Poems published in the anthologies: September eleven; Maryland Voices; Listening to The Water: The Susquehanna Water Anthology; Alternatives To Surrender; Wild Things–Domestic and Otherwise; This Path; From The Porch Swingas well as in various journals including Rattle, Memoir(and) ,, River Poets Journal, Delaware Poetry Review, Yellow Medicine Review, Twisted Tongue, Poetry Monthly, Main Street Rag, Anon.
