Gypsy Sea
Sunrise: necks stretched out like hungry clams
lurch for the Ibuprofen emperor
whose numb fingers wave loners to café chairs—
rivet them to sticky alligator seats, bottom sides
textured with chewing gum madness; daydreams
pull life’s canopy over sand and foam,
seasick tides lick each empowered undertow
sheer bag luck burlesques diffident efforts,
tête-à-tête conversations revealing
epiphany-like promises through opaque glass.
Nightfall: along the coastline, bonfires blaze
bodies gather, mouths breathe desire, minds re-imagine;
moving between cosmic and material worlds,
cleaving mustard greens like an armful of roses,
a gypsy mystic dances like a whirling dervish
toe-ring magic fractures limestone bones
unbrushed by feet for millennia
bangle bracelets and silver cymbals rouse
ever vigilant, sleepy-eyed centurions
stand guard over her Technicolor Roma.
Sun-up: astronomical dawn signals nocturnal closure,
dancing legs and burning feet cease
rhythmically rocking shellfish strongholds;
dense auburn moss calmly spreads its way south
wraps a tranquil riverbed in nature’s sheath
guides an Arabesque estuary toward a
salt water fiord, lateral moraine, where
nourished sediment dwellers burrow home
high tides pull ashes, bathe shorelines
littered with seaweed, driftwood, memories.
Grace
For G. M.
Grace leaned against parked cars
at midnight, full crow moon rays bathing
her body in luminescent grandeur.
Poised. Seductive. Her touch extended
over an embankment like sprouting
foxtail seeds resemble ballerinas that float
on the breeze and hook into dog paws
Fragile. Elastic. Insubstantial. Like bubbles
blown from hoops that burst unpredictably,
Grace’s rainbow brow sought barn owl benedictions
waved goodbye to the summer solstice
welcomed the autumnal equinox—a September song
that harvested her deeply planted thoughts
and sowed them in fields of winter wheat.
Wind passed through cedar branches, eclipsed
Grace’s mantra of green card foreboding
added frivolity and enhanced shorter days
and nights both waiting for December
to push back twilight’s rays—scatter them
in the upper atmosphere—brighten evening skies
warm Dawn’s fingers on the rising sun’s heels.
Wistful Lulamaes
For Audrey Hepburn
Tiffany windows display silver platters
reflect morning light like vintage mirrors
as pedestrians hide behind Oliver Goldsmith sunglasses,
dressed to the nines like Holly Golightly
pose then study its Manhattan showcase framed
by granite walls on Fifth Avenue & 57th Street.
Disguised as stylish escorts, men and women peer
through double-pane glass, appreciate excess & exotica
in equal measure, ponder fleeting holographic images
of John the Baptist’s head etched sterling trays
murmuring silent prophecies, portend gentle greatness
& Big Apple panache for life beyond Sodom’s avenging angels.
Truman Capote’s phantom emerges from Central Park shadows
wears a white suit & hat, moves forward like a garden snail,
maintains a two-block buffer, his high-pitched voice mingling
with car horns & cabbies where rainbows end announces
breakfast availability to Broadway street singers, Soho artists,
moon river enthusiasts, New York tourists, huckleberry friends.
Magyar Sleeves
“The Colour of my soul is iron-grey and sad bats wheel about the steeple of my dreams.”
—Claude Debussy
Grooming themselves
like cats, bat pups clutch
onto their perch upside down,
loosen artistic digits
emerge from slumber
in hollow trees, cave mouths,
attic eves & rocky crevices.
From inverted roosts,
they drop into flight mode
as membrane covered forelimbs
navigate ultrasonic waves
& echolocation identify
evening canvases to paint
with wings like a brush & palette.
Moonlight colonies undercover
zig-zag through mist & gnat clouds,
rising from depths of stone lined wells,
leave watercolor portraits
during witching hours
as children trick or treat
wearing bat capes & cowls.
An award-winning author, poet, and educator, Sterling Warner’s works have appeared in literary magazines, journals, and anthologies including Danse Macabre, Poetry Life and Times, Ekphrastic Review, and Sparks of Calliope. Warner’s collections of poetry include Rags and Feathers, Without Wheels, ShadowCat, Edges, Memento Mori: A Chapbook Redux, Serpent’s Tooth, Flytraps, and Cracks of Light: Pandemic Poetry & Fiction 2019-2022—as well as Masques: Flash Fiction & Short Stories. Currently, Warner writes, participates in “virtual” poetry readings, and enjoys retirement in Washington.
https://www.amazon.com/Cracks of Light: Pandemic Poetry & Fiction
