In The Round

This stage is a holy place

full of all of the colors of human existence

full of now and everynow.

It exists in the present or not at all

in every moment in history.

 

The story is entwined passionately

with love that is not love, pain that is not pain,

coincidence that overcomes every plan.

All life's grand contradictions are played out here,

fear and favor on full display before a jury of her peers.

 

It does not end happily, or ever after

but waits

                   suspended

 

Alive with possibility

that the people will return

to fill their rows, take their places

and try again to get it right.

 

8-8-2022

 

The Myth

You sniff the breeze and feel the difference,

Something new is coming on.

Green was your life,

it was around you and among you.

There were rumors of other colors, out there,

but you were sure they were a myth.

But now, what is this--

brilliant red leaves are appearing

out of your once green ones.

Neighbors all around have become

orange, brown, variegated gold.

Ecstatic color is waking up, and

you discover

you never even knew what color was 
until there was change.

©2015 Donna Jo Wallace

shared with Poets United / Poetry Pantry 326

The Next Season

Faded brown leaves, dry as ash
crackle under my heels,
swirl anxiously around my ankles.

I look up at branches, clearly visible,
and wonder if my old maple misses her leaves,
feels a little exposed without them,

or, if just before she dropped them,
she worried about letting them go.

Do you wonder, old friend, at what rash thought
made you shed your lovely coat all at once;
do you wonder, sometimes,
if you should have saved a few back, just in case?

Now that birds are on the move, and flowers scent the breeze
do you worry, that your last leaf has come and gone,
that you have nothing left to give?

So I will bring my book, sit under your branches,
and wait a while, with you.


©2008 Donna Jo Wallace
shared with Poets United / Poetry Pantry #315

Travelers' Sun

There is something in the setting sun

that can be seen 
only Days from home.

Mile after mile, the sky reveals itself
kisses the horizon, caresses its curves.

Cloud and color dance in Earth's rhythm,
creating a light show for my eyes
that I could easily have missed.

I let my mind play
at the edges of thought.

Slowly, the tightly wound ball of twine
that lives at the back of my head,
the base of my spine

begins to loosen.
I am breathing.

Home
is more vast and welcoming

than I had ever thought.

Mom, the way she used to be, appears beside me

Do you see the sun? she would say

and we would Ah,

and see 
what we had not seen

before.

©2004 Donna Jo Wallace

The Fires Fly

Long ago I discarded the idea

that the backsides of these little insects

contained the fire their names promised.

Still I let them delicately step

across my hands,

wonder at their magic,

respecting them

above all other six-legged creatures,

pets for an evening, then wild once again.

Now I look, caught by surprise

by the field of fireflies before me,

wild, uncatchable, and free.

sparks,

embers of the earth

wild, hot, and fragile

shooting, swirling, sailing

©2008 Donna Jo Wallace

Winter

Silently it enters

a chill, a flake.

Lacy polka-dots appear in the sky,

gently they swirl, transform the outdoors

into a child’s play-toy

Snowmen, sledding, snow forts

for a while.

Today

frozen into this implacable mass

it does not play or tease.

It glares sternly and bites with Cold’s harsh teeth.

Ice over snow over ice

this white-hard rock

brings you down and pens you in.

Piles of snow in the driveway

grow faster than last year’s garden.

We frost-encrusted Iowans will not claim

to savor this white beauty (much)

but we wait for it always to come

and we wait for it always to leave

and we seek that thing in ourselves

that will outlast it

once again.

©2010 Donna Jo Wallace.

Fish Is Their Name

Thrashing, orange, glittering bodies 
creatures that are all tail, 
strange. Something new.
They live in water - enormous water, 
like a big, square lake in a building.

In the memory before memory
I call up the shadows,

A grown-up in our group, it could have been Mama,

puts a shiny coin in a machine.
Small dry brown candy tumbles out,
you have to catch them fast.

Pellets, she calls them, and
shares them around to me and some friends.
She says they are like food, but don't eat them.
She says throw them in, but not all at once.

I hold one nimbly between my baby fingers,
hang onto the rail and throw my pellet hard.

It floats across the air and lands gently 
just touching the surface of the water, 

Like an explosion 
the creatures burst forward,
Compete for my offering
as if it matters.

Fish is their name, I am told. Gold Fish.
They hurl themselves against each other,
thrashing with hunger, their desire insatiable.

These are no pets for a bowl,
these are animals with power.
They jump for my pellets
again and again passionate and wild.

Free as the Amazon 
even in their indoor lake pond.

laughter bubbles from my throat,
I ask for more ...

©2011 Donna Jo Wallace.

Evening Gardener

Tonight, I am an evening gardener

Putting the earth to bed

Cleaning up last season’s weeds

To make room for something new to grow.

Grass stained shoes

traipse the lawn in well-known patterns

Gathering tools, just to put them away

Cleaning earth, where there is endless dirt

Clearing weeds, where they always grow again.

An exercise in foolishness, or faith.

I live with the possibility for a while,

of tomatoes and beans, marigolds and coryopsis

Though reality may make a liar out of me.

For now, the earth and I merely share a moment,

And my vision is enough.

I work until the sun winks at me over the horizon

And blesses another day’s end.

©2011 Donna Jo Wallace.

The Reason for the Music is the Music

The reason for the music is the music.

The reason for the mountain is the mountain.

The reason for the eagle is the eagle.

The words only get in the way.

The roads only obscure the view.

Some things remain wild and exist relentlessly without
You.

If you need a reason,
you missed the point
of all that is.

©2011 Donna Jo Wallace.

Haiku

Haiku

One small blue green sphere
Gasping for its own fresh air
Spins out of control

©2010 Donna Jo Wallace.