Holding Hands with a Rock (Chant)

clap hands.

clap hands.

stones tremble.

stones ring. 

clap hands.

clap hands

stones tremble.

stones sing.

sumptuous earth

groundswell blessing
each little continent

whirls in hope turning

shape wrought of fire

wintered pucker, ropy water

bead breaker
seed shaker

clap hands.
clap hands.
stones tremble.
stones ring.

clap hands.
clap hands.
stones tremble.
stones sing. 

stone egg crack open
heart of stone released
fierce future brings together
stone hearts burst or cease

clap hands.
clap hands.
stones tremble.
stones ring.

clap hands.
clap hands.
stones tremble.
stones sing. 


future, guide our mending

ancestors, rout our sending

pebble cells and stone bodies
unmake our deadening

clap hands.
clap hands.
stones tremble.
stones ring.

clap hands.
clap hands.
stones tremble.
stones sing. 

Stones of Memory Workshop 

2014

Dr. Charles Charlie Martin

One of the city’s marginal,

laughing in genuine mirth,

passed me going the other way.

That was last week.

Today a barefoot woman

roared at Market Street.

I had my face on,

and I didn’t know (often)

what I should do.

That’s part of urban life:

how busses are big red ads

and a busy street is a zoo.

It might have been the laughing man

who defaced the photo

where suddenly my feet

stopped: a doctor, stethoscope,

magic-marked red mouth,
neat black hair and bowtie,

and wet, beating heart

held on his fingertips

beneath the texture of trample. 

And the White Ginger is about to Bloom

“This will be a hard thing that I am going to tell you”

and with a shrimp taco (in red sauce) in front of me

R. told me how he had been to the top of the hospital parking lot a couple of times to look down and see how far he would fall if he went over the ledge and that two weeks ago he bought a half gallon of vodka that he carried up there with the intention of seeing if he uncapped and drank some he would gain enough courage to jump

“R. you gotta call Psych and tell them this and text me you called in”

and he apparently did as I received a text from R. that intake would be the next day

And the white ginger is about to bloom

the giant dahlia is above the deck communing with night blooming jasmine

the persimmons are turning gold/orange

big black “O” the barn cat finishes his perimeter check, sits in the deck door opening

and the white ginger is about to bloom.

IMUNURI Prompt: "Read" something illegible (Projective Symbiosis)

One of human's favorite activities is projecting meaning into the dense ineffable catterwaul of nature, culture, and life. Are these moments of fathomless oracular power or hopeless species-dominant voicings? Find something ineffable and actively project meaning into/through/with/in/and/on/as it. The scrollwork of beetles under bark. A painting of modern art. The fugue state of clouds. Bonus to metacognize in your poem or creation your idea about whether you are speaking through, as, or for. Bonus to include a visual representation of your projective symbiont.

Image: Bark Beetle Galleries from Wikimedia Commons

keywords: your name, poem, read