In Harbor
Category: Writing and Poetry

Sometimes I want to go to sea
and brave the storms, but other times . . .

In Harbor

I want to hear the water lap
in harbor, not at sea.
I want to berth in cozy coves
and read my mystery.
I'll leave the navigation chores
to sailors more astute.
While they plot courses by the charts,
I'll learn to play the flute
and send sweet notes aloft to touch
the very tallest spar,
perhaps to reach the stars above
that guide us from afar.

© Ella Gale

6:19 AM - 20 Comments - 26 Kudos - Add Comment

Sun Salutations
Category: Writing and Poetry

While traveling around the country, I found
that I woke earlier and thus saw more sunrises.
These little poems were written
in acknowledgement and appreciation.

Greeting the Dawn

O morning Sun, not yet arisen,
your light has come to me, unbidden,
to open up another day.
I know not what will come my way,
except that you will come, unbidden,
O morning Sun, not yet arisen.

Rainy Dawn

Ancient myths call the rain your sperm,
spent to green the barren Earth.
Hear me, hear me, beclouded Sun:
this Earth and I are each quite old.
If I shed my clothes to bathe in your rain,
may I also bloom anew?

Morning Prayer

O Sun that arrives
to unlock the prison of night,
release me from dark hours
of longing for touch.

Teach me, again,
to sing the praises of Earth,
as I rise and place my feet
to walk another day.

© Ella Gale

7:31 AM - 15 Comments - 16 Kudos - Add Comment

Wind Chimes
Category: Writing and Poetry

Wind Chimes

Ceramic parallelograms
hung suspended from above
send pleasure to the eyes
but aching to the ears
which strain to hear the clink and clank
(communal joy of clay)
caused either by rough hand of wind
or gentle passerby.
But there they hang, untouched, unheard
in isolation's impotence.

© Ella Gale

3:11 PM - 23 Comments - 24 Kudos - Add Comment

Ballad of the River-Road
Category: Writing and Poetry

Though I usually write short poems, one will

occasionally fly onto a second page, such as

this from a year ago.

Song of the River-Road

On a mountain road curling down to the sea,

And the visibility poor,

I imagined I heard a soft low song

Over my engine's roar,

Perhaps a verse of a country tune,

Or maybe just a refrain:

And the mists hung low and the cows did low,

And the hillsides disappeared.

Appropriate words on a lonely road

When everything seems to merge,

Taking the curves at a slower pace,

Though the cattle were off the verge.

As the mists grew dense, I rode on in

And the words sang in my ears:

And the mists hung low and the cows did low,

And the hillsides disappeared.

And then, a sense of forever space

Where a trusting heart could flow,

And the road became a river-road

Where I steered my craft just so,

Keeping an eye on that starboard bank

In the current swift and black:

And the mists hung low and the cows did low,

And the hillsides disappeared.

And though the hills would soon return,

For now, they were not here

As I floated along in a time eclipse,

Sampling a different sphere:

The sound of my motor the rushing water,

My passage unremarked:

And the mists hung low and the cows did low,

And the hillsides disappeared.

And suddenly then I'm through the pass,

Driving on to the sea

Through a valley gilded green and gold

By sun too bright to see,

With herds on the right and herds on the left,

And a roadway straight on through:

But where are the mists that hung so low,

And the hills that disappeared?

And part of me wants to turn around,

To turn around right here,

To go back on that river-road

Where everything's not so clear,

Floating along in that time eclipse,

Exploring the spaces within:

Where the mists hang low and the cows do low,

And the hillsides disappear.

© Ella Gale

2:54 AM - 10 Comments - 10 Kudos - Add Comment

The Mother Poems: See Inside
Category: Writing and Poetry

See Inside

Here's the compact
I'd given mama years before.
It's silver, underneath the tarnish;
Her hair was silver, too.
See inside, a bit of powder
And in the mirror
An old woman
With tears in her eyes.

© Ella Gale

6:33 AM - 15 Comments - 16 Kudos - Add Comment

Lost and Found - Collaboration
Category: Writing and Poetry

I expressed an interest in collaboration and
Neil graciously suggested we try one. Here it is:

Lost and Found

I fell in love
Listen to me, falling
Falling so far
In the heaven of your eyes

Where I am lost
Deep in space
Out of my orbit
Calling your name

There was a time
When I thought I was lost
In the vast nothing
That was my life

Until you offered love
And I find
That to be lost in you
Is to be found

6:17 PM - 21 Comments - 20 Kudos - Add Comment

The Mother Poems: In Central Park
Category: Writing and Poetry

Over time, I have written a few poems that involve my mother.
This one, "In Central Park," is the latest written, but the incident
described is the earliest.

In Central Park

I fled from the man in the rocks
The man high in the boulders
The man unbuckling his belt
Who wanted to show me something.

A six year old, I fled to my mother,
To reach my mother,
My mother
Who had no fear.

The rocks were a high, high pile of boulders
And I slipped down them and slid down them
And I ran
I ran to my mother
My mother
Sitting there on the bench
Reading her book, she was
Reading her book,
And I told her, I told her
About the man, the man,
High in the rocks
Who wanted to show me something.

And my mother forgot her book
She forgot her book as she ran
She ran, my mother who had no fear,
She ran and climbed the boulders
To catch the culpit, the man.

And I climbed behind her,
Climbed behind,
Wondering what she would do
My mother
Who had no fear
What my mother would do
If she caught him
What would she do.

But he was gone, not there,
He was not to be found,
Not found.
We looked all over
My mother and I,
All over the rocks.
He had fled, fled in fear,
In fear of a mother,
He had fled from my mother
My mother
Who had no fear.

©Ella Gale

9:33 PM - 15 Comments - 14 Kudos - Add Comment

Reprise
Category: Writing and Poetry

Reprise

It is a year today since my heart
was exposed, opened, and repaired.
In celebration, I chose to walk the beach,
finding to my surprise a day of minus tide,
that extreme condition, the lowest of the low.
A year ago on this day there had also been
a minus tide, the beach extending
further and further as the water receded,
revealing lengths of sand and rock,
and creatures usually submerged.
This was a tide when shoreline caves or caverns
were emptied. Like chambers of the heart,
normally filled with salted pulsing
fluids of life, all became open
to the eyes, to the touch of strangers.
Did my heart complain at such flagrant display?
Or did it wait, in kinship with the shore and its creatures,
trusting in silent knowledge of return?

© Ella Gale

12:43 AM - 14 Comments - 12 Kudos - Add Comment

Ella Has Been Tagged ! ! !
Category: Writing and Poetry

Ella Has Been Tagged ! ! !

Ohhhh!! I knew it. Sooner or later this would happen. Well, I have been tagged by Neil. Now I must list 10 weird/odd/unusual/interesting things about myself. Here goes:

1. After a divorce at age 67, I bought a 19 foot Roadtrek RV and traveled by myself around the U.S. for seven years looking for a place to settle down. It was only supposed to be one or two years, but I was enjoying the trip.

2. I always have more books than groceries. And, I suppose, spend more time with the books. Even in the RV, I had more books than groceries.

3. Though I have amassed a collection of old irons, I never, well almost never, do any ironing.

4. My former husband and I maintain an ongoing friendship. We don't think this is weird, odd, or unusual, but most people do not understand it. It's really easy - he lives in Massachusetts and I live in California.

5. I have brewed and drunk Kombucha, a tea fermentation, almost continuously since 1994. It is supposed to be healthy - cures anything and everything, if you want to believe the literature. I just think it is fun to make and it tastes good. Anyone interested in information can use Goggle to bring up Wikipedia and other sites.

6. Each time one of my three offspring reached the age of 21, I celebrated a graduation from parenthood. Motherhood (as an historical event) is forever, but parenthood is a process. There is an end to it.

7. I told my kids to skip the usual Mother's Day celebration. I figure my mother's days were the days I became a mother, i.e., their birthdays. They mostly ignore this one.

8. Despite being raised in New York City, I became a country dweller and gardener and raised children, chickens, ducks, and a couple of geese. Also three dogs and three cats. All in all, the kids were the easiest; they understood English.

9. I have moved around a lot. As a child in New York City, I lived with my Mom and Dad in three apartments in Brooklyn, three in Manhattan, and a house in Queens. After marriage, my husband and I lived in an apartment in Queens and two apartments in Japan (US Navy assignments). Then we moved back to the apartment in Queens and to a house on Long Island. Next a series of corporate moves: Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Minnesota, South Carolina and Massachusetts. After the divorce, I bought the RV and took off to see places of MY choice. (See 1.)

10. I have lived in my current apartment for the last six years. But I still drive the RV and am getting itchy for adventure.

* * *

P.S. Following the instructions, I have put together a list of the next 10 to be tagged:

* * * AND THE WINNERS ARE * * *

Antony

Born with many talents

Bloodroot

Chalkios

dianne

Inner Beauty

Michael

Pea

pfp

Queen "So DEFF" Michelle

4:50 AM - 12 Comments - 11 Kudos - Add Comment

Food for Thought
Category: Writing and Poetry

Food for Thought

Though there is a beginning
and there is a finish,
like slices of bread
that bracket a sandwich,

it's the meat in the middle
that nourishes life,
with lettuce for crunch
and mustard for spice.

© Ella Gale

4:16 AM - 26 Comments - 24 Kudos - Add Comment

Marker
Category: Writing and Poetry

   
Marker

Oh, Carol, yet again I've trod
on your good name.
How come your name lies here?
Perhaps as testament to youthful passion,
though inscribed with neither heart
nor crude cruel arrow.
Or weariness with incessant
"shoulds," "should nots," provoked
Kilroyesque response.
Maybe just an "I dare you" moment,
bred by laughter and
a wet and virgin beckoning.
However, Carol, came your name,
rest asssured:
Immobile immortality
on a slab of concrete sidewalk
is more than Fate grants many.



© Ella Gale

1:42 PM - 8 Comments - 8 Kudos - Add Comment

Into the Night
Category: Writing and Poetry

Into the Night

A glimpse of wing, by lamplight lit,
that perched above, in darkness hid.
"And who are you, and who am I,"
I softly called into the night
whence came an echoed "Whoo...Whoo."



© Ella Gale

7:54 PM - 6 Comments - 6 Kudos - Add Comment

Grassland
Category: Writing and Poetry

4:31 PM - 10 Comments - 10 Kudos - Add Comment

Chinese Tonight?
Category: Writing and Poetry

Chinese Tonight?

I don't understand Chinese, I thought,
as I waited my turn to be seated.
The clock read only five,
yet every booth was filled,
with shades of gray, shades of gray.
Eyes read menus, mouths ate food,
careful hands reached into wallets.
Has everything been said, and said again?
Has everything been tasted?
Some vital signs or sounds
(I need to nourish me)
are muted, flat, or missing here.
I'll tell the hostess I may be back.
But not tonight.
I don't understand Chinese.



© Ella Gale

8:35 AM - 11 Comments - 11 Kudos - Add Comment

Trips
Category: Writing and Poetry

Trips

Three trips I've found,
aside from psychedelic,
on which there are no local stops,
and you don't know where you're going:
       birthing a child
       reaching for climax
       falling in love.
Death may be another,
but this I have not taken -
the fare is still too high.

©  Ella Gale

10:35 PM - 14 Comments - 11 Kudos - Add Comment