Copyright ©2015 by Marilyn Kiss All rights, including electronic, reserved by the author. Author of Signal Moments: Poems of Loss and an Antidote (Austin, TX: Plain View Press, 2007) and Pacharán Dreams: The Pamplona Poems (Austin, TX: Plain View Press, 2010)
Marilyn Kiss, (PhD, Rutgers University) teaches Spanish language and literature courses at Wagner College, Staten Island, New York. She is the author of two books of poetry, Signal Moments: Poems of Loss and an Antidote (Austin, TX: Plain View Press, 2007) and Pacharán Dreams: The Pamplona Poems (Austin, TX: Plain View Press, 2010). An avid traveler and exhibiting photographer, she works with several arts organizations on Staten Island and is president of the Staten Island Creative Community. She is currently working on The Cancer Chronicles: Poems from the Edge.Type your paragraph here.
Slimy: BP Spill (May 10, 2010)
Slimy the pelican,
Slimy the duck,
Slimy, slimy, slimy
the corporate schmuck
who “drilled, baby, drilled”
in the Gulf waters.
Slimy the feathers,
Slimy the scales,
Slimy, slimy, slimy
the oil rig males
who sold their souls
for fossil fuel profits.
Slimy the ads
Slimy in DC
Slimy the “B”
and slimy the “P.”
Slimy the Ford
and slimy the Chevy
Slimy, slimy, slimy the trucks
oh, so heavy.
Slimy the drivers
like you and
like me
bathed in oil, all,
addicted and sublime.
Our lifestyle is past its prime.
Our lifestyle is OUT OF TIME.
______________________________
Homage to RC: 1907-1964
Bathed in birdsong
beyond beak and feather
beyond vocal chords and alphabet
beyond diachronic and dictionaries
beyond, beyond…
Into the plaintive note
Into the insomniac’s call
Into the darkness harmonized,
the dawn, personified.
What scales are these?
What tones so vibrant?
What cacophonies so controlled?
What wonders so majestic?
Dear Rachel,
Dear Carson,
If the summer were silent,
we too would be quiescent.
If the autumn were silent,
we too would be colorless.
If the winter were silent,
we too would be voiceless.
If the spring were silent…?
______________________________
What do you say to an elephant?
What do you say to an elephant?
The ivory handle on my carving knife
is more valuable than your life?
The trinkets sold on the streets are enhanced by your blood, your death?
The wars being waged across your continent
are being funded by your tusks?
What excuse can you make to an elephant?
Dear mourner for your dead;
dear poster child for memory;
dear mammal of proportions
beyond our range or measure;
dear communicator;
dear fellow being.
I weep.
I despair.
We need you among us.