StarPoet Newsletter Vol. XII, No. XXVI

Saturday, 25 June 2011 22:00 Last Updated on Saturday, 25 June 2011 22:07

The StarPoet Newsletter
Vol. XII, No. XXVI (June 26, 2011 C.E.)

Where you gonna run to with the summer bearing down? Half a year gone, half a year gone.

Above the Rockies, The Milky Way
Stains the heavens with infinite possibilities,
Below, with you, on Planet Earth,
I have everything I ever need.

Lisa Jain Thompson c. 2011 C.E.


The Fourth looms a week away. Fireworks, parties, beer and soda, hamburgers, steaks and apple pie.

kick started by Charles Ives one muggy afternoon
The Woods on Declaration Day
The woods were dark, deep, and starry The night we took old Dixie down, Ives was playing Declaration Day While Seeger performed Tom Thumb, Chuck Berry was on the bandstand, As young and good as ever he was, Wilson was taking notes on the sideline, Conducting symphonies inside his head While Phil Specter waited patiently For a chance to strut his stuff. A grand group we were, grand group we are, Full of vinegar, piss and great magic To challenge the gods themselves: That the eastern heavens did not tremble, The revered gods are far more jealous Than even they imagine, but it was not Our problem and certainly not concern; We did what we can, do what we must, And if the lords of the manor ignore us, We will still dance as always bright Draped with sweet hyacinth and moonlight.
— Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2011)

My companion and I were alone with the stars: the misty river of the Milky Way flowing across the sky, the patterns of the constellations standing out bright and clear, a blazing planet low on the horizon. -- Rachel Carson

minutes and hours float in and out of memory
The Memory Be Green
My mother's house, my house, Crowds around the driveway, Medics, neighbors, my mother alone inside, Winston is dead, your father has died, His body cooling on his garage floor, Eyes open, staring at the rafters, I hand my toddler daughter to Jimmy, Second mother to all of us, And go inside, mom softly sobbing, No words but he's in the garage, I close his eyes, kiss his lips, Say goodbye the best I can, Wipe my eyes and go back in To the business of burying And our life without my father.
Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2011)

I have seen her when the moon is new
Whitethorn
A whisper unchained in the night, A graceful presence, softly focused, Lighting all the fuses she can find To see what goes boom in the darkness
— Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2011)

The Milky Way is nothing else but a mass of innumerable stars planted together in clusters. -- Galileo Galilei

due east at dawn, west at dusk
Star
Into the sun, Car by car, West to east, Then east to west, Cornea flinching, Lids tightly sealed, Traffic to a crawl While star does its thing.
Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2011)

Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving And revolving at nine hundred miles an hour, That's orbiting at nineteen miles a second, so it's reckoned, A sun that is the source of all our power. The sun and you and me and all the stars that we can see Are moving at a million miles a day In an outer spiral arm, at forty thousand miles an hour, Of the galaxy we call the 'Milky Way'.	-- Monty Python, Galaxy Song by Eric Idle

the joker's question
Self-Deception
Strauss-Kahn in handcuffs, Weiner crying at the mike, Arnold out there by himself With nary a brave wife by their sides; Boys will be boys, but men must be men, Rape is not sex, adultery, not marriage, A chambermaid is not a girlfriend, A dying wife, not last year's blonde; A horse has a penis, a dog, a baboon, But a man has free will even when He doesn't have the good sense to use it.
Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2011)

memories of the poet child
Ally Ally
Ally ally oxen free, Come out, come out Wherever you are, One potato, two potato, Three potato, four, Five potato, six potato, Seven potato more, Eenie, meenie, minie, moe, Catch a tiger by his toe, --Except, of course, back then, It wasn't a tiger, was it?-- If he hollers let him go, Eenie, meenie, minie, mo, My mother told me to turn The dirty dish rag inside out, Gone, gone, gone like all those Elephants in the room crying Ally ally oxen free.
-- Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2011)

Our galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars. It's a hundred thousand light years side to side. It bulges in the middle, sixteen thousand light years thick, But out by us, it's just three thousand light years wide. We're thirty thousand light years from galactic central point. We go 'round every two hundred million years, And our galaxy is only one of millions of billions In this amazing and expanding universe. -- Monty Python, Galaxy Song by Eric Idle

underneath it all
See Ya Tomorrow
See you tomorrow If the sun don't blow, If the river don't rise, If the mountain don't fall, If the tornado don't come And drop me back in Kansas, If my dinner don't poison me And send me to Emergency, If my heart don't stop And my brain don't stroke, If the Rapture don't arrive And Pi don't never terminate.
Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2011)

take a good look around
Bullets and Verbs
There must be someway out of here, Some seemly service road that would Lead us to the right direction, Connect us to some future somewhere Outside of the current carnival, That would allow us to continue on our Westerly course without all this Internecive argument and whining. We dance too easily to the music, The inevitable spotlight beckons, The camera draws us to performance, The rattle tat tat of guns and words, Cowboys and professors, bullets and verbs, Quickstep in the moonlight for our amusement.
— Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2011)

The universe itself keeps on expanding and expanding In all of the directions it can whizz As fast as it can go, at the speed of light, you know, Twelve million miles a minute, and that's the fastest speed there is. So remember, when you're feeling very small and insecure, How amazingly unlikely is your birth, And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space, 'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth. -- Monty Python, Galaxy Song by Eric Idle

life goes one
Guard with a Gat
Guard with a Gat Shouting to a friend -- Hey Reuben! Reuben! -- With a big grin, He might as well Been carrying his lunch For all the notice The automatic got -- We barely noticed Anything but his smile And deep bass shout: Life adapts To the circumstance.
— Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2011)

in case you were wondering
The Likeness Taller than the median For a woman of her generation, Shorter than tall for the current one; Large brown eyes, a largely Italian nose, Lips that are too ethnic For the middle of the last century, A Mediterranean plush to match her olive skin, Cheekbones that are a tribute To her People of the Longhouse, Breasts that are smaller than The modern silconic expectation, Flesh that has grown weightier Than anyone would prefer; A smoke-husky voice, hoarse and low, From decades of fighting allergies, A contralto, perhaps, on the good days, Somewhat deeper on the rest; A brain that matches well with the best, A skillful muse that few possess, A true poet's voice rising over An age that could care less.
— Lisa Jain Thompson (June 2011)
Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people. -- Carl Sagan


Copyright © Lisa Jain Thompson 1948-2011. Back issues are in the Newsletter Section of the StarPoet website. Visit my contact page and get in touch.