StarPoet Newsletter Vol. XIII, No. XXIV

Saturday, 09 June 2012 20:00 Last Updated on Thursday, 07 June 2012 14:34

The StarPoet Newsletter
Vol. XIII, No. XXIV (June 10, 2012 C.E.)

This has not been a good week, but you'll find that out soon enough. I would ask you to enjoy the poems the best you can,

the sun, the clouds
the river in the distance
the eagle overhead
watching young squirrels
learn the rules
summer in the semi-urban
with cardinals and mockings
mixed with a stray bark
as our soundtrack

Lisa Jain Thompson c. 2012 C.E.


the poet is a working girl, her life charted bead by bead in her words

the gunk in the air
The Theory
My theory is somebody brought something back, Some desert fungus or Afghan mountain fever That we now all pass around, lung to lung, Inside the bad air of the Pentagon Until our dying sinuses are destroyed And our brains are turned to mush, Not that our collective synapses were ever Even close to top sirloin, if anything, We're more of a family-pack hamburger.
— Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2012)

Not "Seeing is Believing," you ninny, but "Believing is Seeing." For modern art has become completely literary: the paintings and other works exist only to illustrate the text. -- Tom Wolfe

starpoet I
Torsion
Every black hole, Another baby universe, Spacetime expanding exponentially Beyond the event horizon; A rapid recoil Full of mass and dark energy, Snapping out from the origin Towards life and infinity And the eternal hope Of the newly born.
Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2012)

starpoet II
Non-Singular Big Bounce Cosmology
Closed yet unbounded, Out universe exists, A localized region of space In the fabric of the cosmos; Matter's motion through the horizon Sets the course of time's arrow, Then, now, and evermore. — Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2012)

Radical Chic, after all, is only radical in Style; in its heart it is part of Society and its traditions - Politics, like Rock, Pop, and Camp, has its uses. - - Tom Wolfe

inevitable
Scars
My hand where the jeep Tore out my flesh and bone, My heel where sharp scalpels Twice removed a fatty tumor Now returned for a third, My torso below the ribs Where we carefully scoped out My dying gall bladder, My heart where at eighteen Catie left me for another And tickets for the Beatles' Last concert at Candlestick; Looking back, I don't know She made the wrong decision.
Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2012)

A cult is a religion with no political power. -- Tom Wolfe

there are people who would like to claim this
Tintinnabuli
A poem is an exact connection From one person to another, From times long past To our children and grandchildren, Memories set alive By words carefully chosen To inflame both mind and soul. A poem divides life's colors, Shines light into the common corners That make up our existence And separate us from one another: We are full spectrum primates, Trees to two feet, the onliest Subject of any consequence.
Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2012)

life, sun, and genes
Mare Meum
Bright deep blue sky, Thin bleach white clouds, Iris shuttering sun Bearing down on my flesh As I coax my body back To a medium olive tan; I still won't speak archaic Greek Or more than a splattering Of Spanish and Sicilian, Nor will I be able to recite The Qur'an from memory, But I will look somewhat healthier With my indoor pallor restored To an ancestral Mediterranean.
-- Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2012)

It is very comforting to believe that leaders who do terrible things are, in fact, mad. That way, all we have to do is make sure we don't put psychotics in high places and we've got the problem solved. -- Tom Wolfe

cynicism
Life on Planet Earth
A man's leg sliced off, A woman's last grasp, Goods looted, purses stolen, Guns discharged and throats slit; The flash headlines Scrolling across the screen, This just in, earthquakes in Italy, A plane crash in Brazil, Violence in Afghanistan, And nuclear weapons everywhere; The Arabs hate Israeli, They both hate Iran, The blacks are sure the whites Are cheating them and the 'Spanics Are stealin all the jobs. Welcome to the real world everyone, Y'all be sure to duck When the asteroid hits And don't give me any nonsense About how more talk will solve this When the world is collapsing On our doorstep.
Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2012)

Cedar I
Cedar's Green Undercoat
Cedar's undercoat, a gray-white fur Below his deep reddish top coat, Accumulates in Border Collie hair bunnies In the corners and crannies of our home. We gather them up in tennis size balls We then toss on the back patio for The birds to deconstruct back into material For the nests they maintain and build. Cedar, the birds, and we are all quite green Without the need for the nanny state to intervene, Even the squirrels sometimes share in Cedar's coat of Many colors as part of our small animal set aside program.
— Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2012)

The problem with fiction, it has to be plausible. That's not true with non-fiction. -- Tom Wolfe

Cedar II
The Yearling
There is a doe and her yearling, A young one in her belly, In the run this evening Where the dogs are taken To do their business. She is skittish, quickly vanishes, Her dusky body across the treeline; The yearling hesitates for the moment, Assesses the new creatures She has discovered, Decides safety of more importance Than satiating her curiosity And joins her mother Somewhere off camera, The dog seems to shrug, As if to say Be that way, And goes back to attending His primary interests Before the world and he Grow dark.
— Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2012)

Cedar III
Today Cedar Looks Cedar, who cannot stand up today, Looks at us with pleading eyes, Hoping we'll have another primate miracle To make him young and strong again. We have no magic formulas, No quick and easy solutions That would reverse his body's aging, But we do not tell him that And promise him things will be better After we all visit the Vet. We hope we are not lying, Knowing someday we will be, But perhaps, perhaps not today. Coda: At 8:20 P.M. 6 June 2012, twelve hours after this poem was written, Cedar succombed to wounds suffered defending Sharon's life from three attackers a decade ago. Sharon and I were at his side when he died. A Champion Herder, A Warrior and a Companion Dog, he was the smartest, bravest dog we have ever met. Cedar was a close and true friend to both of us and a honored member of our family. At the end, we told him we loved him and everything was going to be alright. Then he died in our arms. We do not expect to see another like him in our lifetimes. Rest in Peace Cedar. We will miss you.
— Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2012)
The Last Day The last day began at three in the morning When Cedar woke me for the final time, He was checking on my state of being, Counted me with his wet cold nose, Then walked off to his water for a drink. After the water, he wandered to the front door, Making sure it was secure before settling On the rug there (but not before noisily Rearranging it to his personal liking) And Cedar and I drifted back to sleep. When I woke at five, he was not on his blanket Beside me, nor was he laying by the door, I found him sprawled near his water dish, His body contorted into an unnatural position, His eyes looking up me, asking for help. The Border Collie who had saved Sharon's life When she was attacked by three anti-woman muggers, The dog who defended me from strangers when we Would go out at night on those necessary walks, Could no longer lift himself from the floor. I pat his head, scratch his nose the way he likes, Tell him he was a good boy and I'd be back, Then went to our bedroom to wake Sharon, Pushing back the tears rolling from my eyes And tell her Cedar's body had finally failed him. Sharon and I move down on the floor beside Cedar, Attempt to sit him upright and fail miserably, He licks my hand as I hold him and Sharon's Fingers gingerly probe his spine and hips: Cedar appears alert, admits to no pain, as ever. But he cannot stand, he cannot walk, he cannot Tell us what has gone wrong or where he hurts, We are the human primates he looks up to, The members of his pack that he depends on And there is nothing we can do at all. Sharon and I stood up, hugged each other tightly, Water falling eye to shoulders, hearts broken, Ripped from us by god and evolution's determination That we who live must also some day truly die, We bleed deep emptiness while deciding what we must do. The last thing Cedar would want is to cause us pain, The last thing we want is to have Cedar suffer needlessly For weeks or months with no hope of eventual recovery Or even a partial return of his motor functions -- We respect Cedar too much to subject him to that. The question was never what's good for us, what do we want, But what is best for Cedar, what would he tell us if he Could convey his thoughts to our feeble primate brains? He was a world class athlete, a brilliant problem solver, A brave friend who made hard choices when necessary. We postponed the decision we knew we must reach, Took Cedar one last time to the vet to find a miracle That would give us an alternative we all could live with, Left him there to be examined before returning that afternoon To see if Cedar could surprise us one last time. Sharon and I reviewed the lab work with the doctor, Worked our way through the multiple X-rays showing Grave deterioration along Cedar's spine and hip, Counted the stones in his kidney and bladder, Touched the image of his swollen distorted liver. The doctor asks if we need time to make a decision, Sharon says no, we need time to be alone with Cedar, They carry Cedar into the sterile examination room, Place him on the floor, leave, and we sit down beside him To talk and comfort and cry and say goodbye. Cedar sees that we are upset and tries to reassure us, Growing calm and protective, doing his duty to the end, We rub his head, hold him in our arms the best we can, Fail miserably in holding back our tears as Cedar Remains strong as only a Border Collie can. We call for the doctor, we sign the papers, He fetches the needles, the sedative and the lethal, He asks us if we are ready, we lay our hands on Cedar And tell him yes, the needles push in, Cedar looks At us one last time and then he leaves us. His body fights the drugs, convulses, demands To continue living, slowly surrenders to the darkness As his flesh and muscles, blood and lungs continue To shudder minutes after his heart appears to stop, And then there is empty silence except for our sobs. The doctor closes Cedar's eyes, we hold Cedar close And I kiss his nose one more time for forever, Then thank the Doctor for his skill and effort And tell him we will be out shortly after we Somehow come to terms with what we have just done. There is no question we made the right decision, No question, the decision Cedar would have chosen, But it is a decision we must learn to live with, There is a hole in our lives where Cedar resides, One we will not easily forget nor do we want to. His blanket still spreads across the living room floor, My eyes still search for him at the door or his dish, He will no longer joyously greet me when I return from work And I will not give him a Meaty Bone each time I leave Or fill his dish with Purina at suppertime when we eat. Cedar haunts each breath and waking moment, Fills the corner of our dreams with happy memories, We see his leash and wonder if we should walk him, Wake in early morning and check if he has water, Wonder why Cedar had to die when others still live. Lisa Jain Thompson, in Northern Virginia the morning after, June 7, 2012 C. E.


Copyright © Lisa Jain Thompson 1948-2012. Back issues are in the Newsletter Section of the StarPoet website. Visit my contact page and get in touch.