"whirligig" poems
The Cross, the Cross
Goes deeper in than we know,
Deeper into life;
Right into the marrow
And through the bone.
Along the back of the baby tortoise
The scales are locked in an arch like a bridge,
Scale-lapping, like a lobster's sections
Or a bee's.
Then crossways down his sides
Tiger-stripes and wasp-bands.
Five, and five again, and five again,
And round the edges twenty-five little ones,
The sections of the baby tortoise shell.
Four, and a keystone;
Four, and a keystone;
Four, and a keystone;
Then twenty-four, and a tiny little keystone.
It needed Pythagoras to see life playing with counters on the living back
Of the baby tortoise;
Life establishing the first eternal mathematical tablet,
Not in stone, like the Judean Lord, or bronze, but in life-clouded, life-rosy tortoise shell.
The first little mathematical gentleman
Stepping, wee mite, in his loose trousers
Under all the eternal dome of mathematical law.
Fives, and tens,
Threes and fours and twelves,
All the volte face of decimals,
The whirligig of dozens and the pinnacle of seven.
Turn him on his back,
The kicking little beetle,
And there again, on his shell-tender, earth-touching belly,
The long cleavage of division, upright of the eternal cross
And on either side count five,
On each side, two above, on each side, two below
The dark bar horizontal.
The Cross!
It goes right through him, the sprottling insect,
Through his cross-wise cloven psyche,
Through his five-fold complex-nature.
So turn him over on his toes again;
Four pin-point toes, and a problematical thumb-piece,
Four rowing limbs, and one wedge-balancing head,
Four and one makes five, which is the clue to all mathematics.
The Lord wrote it all down on the little slate
Of the baby tortoise.
Outward and visible indication of the plan within,
The complex, manifold involvedness of an individual creature
Plotted out
On this small bird, this rudiment,
This little dome, this pediment
Of all creation,
This slow one.
11.7k
The sirens blared that 4th of July
Officer Duncan gave Mammy a ride
An emergency dash to the hospital
He’s 2 months premature Mammy cried
Deaf, dumb and blind is what the doctors said
To our mother when Sammy was born
But none of us kids ever were told
Until Sammy was stable and grown
Pappy declared that they’d both be fine
Not believing dire news doctors gave
We happily named him Uncle Sam
Trusting in him to be strong and brave
His 1st 5 months in an incubator
Hooked up to every device
In Newton Wellesley Hospital, 1959
A miracle saved his life
Reaching gloved hands through holes in the side
Weighing just a bit over 2 pounds
Looking more like a spindly ET
I was amazed to be hearing breath sounds
Sam worked on doubling his weight by Christmas
Nothing seemed easy or fast
Still Mammy survived the eclampsia
And Sammy went home at last
Returning a few years later
Sammy’s doctor she would find
To show off to all the nurses
Her son NOT deaf, dumb and blind
I so love my brother Sammy
Always felt like a sister and mother
I’d give all I have for the time
Just a minute more with my dear brother
I’d speak to you of those 57 years
Of the great whirligig you carved with your hands
All the times you showed up for me
Through the good and the bad our love stands
You wasted no time hating anybody
Children and dogs always your friends
Quick for a laugh despite any lack
I draw comfort that all your pain ends
The sirens blared once again for you
The ambulance came, the paramedics tried
Racing you trying to save you
All in vain, in the OR you died
Like Tommy’s rock opera is over
Perhaps you paused to speak to a stray dog
While keeping your divine appointment
By reaching right into the hand of God
Dec 30, 2016
Dec 30, 2016 at 9:12 PM UTC
To reminisce, while all the world is pride,
I sit it out (remembering the flood),
I sometimes felt that hope had all but died.
Look west, sharp swallows sweep the sun aside,
Tomorrow’s hurt quakes within the mind; odd
To reminisce, while all the world is pride.
In moments lost, instances regretted,
The whirligig of time spins out some mood,
(I sometimes felt that hope had all but died.)
The evening light’s remorseful spendthrift tide
Gleamed gold, for just a moment, like a god
(To reminisce, while all the world is pride)
Shining just enough to halt some sad slide,
Clouds clear away before there’s time to brood,
(I sometimes felt that hope had all but died.)
To come full circle, reach home port, and hide
Each painful loss through trial, trust or blood.
To reminisce, while all the world is pride,
I sometimes felt that hope had all but died.
Jan 10, 2011
Jan 10, 2011 at 2:38 AM UTC
*r EVOL ution
uncoils slowly by the fire
pondering of profound-flickering in the reverse-sparks
within the pupils of shifting-light*
1.
love(r) dips deep within a hardy fire-maker from another sky
body recycled and soul carried on
mind unlike any other
it’s simply a matter of Time.. holding that rusty-key of long ago
entrusted to a cavorite-place behind silent-wells whose treadle-functions heaven forgot
2.
yet what counts highest sits on a ledge of paradox
as happiness falls short upon the threshold of fornever and never after
there are tumult-fears to overcome
and it needs time, once again
as hearty does beseech temporal-cogs to ensure one full revolution
thanks are not enough for things that words fail to express
no specific thing to pin-point
of the immense power the discharged-missile holds
who is ever the same person in the marching of months?
3.
exponential growth is combustion understated and surreal-excitement catches
to find traction in the whistling wind.. only a quarter-whisper away
it has instead.. been phenomenally unreal
.. can't explain it
.. won't deny it
4.
the full idea has near-outgrown its twin-seal flanks
that choices came shaking.. aghast and
dripping its magenta-fury in heavy-drips upon the sand
half-spilling lava-filled cups of ire
near the camp-side
grabbed it by the lapels
shaking – I love you so
now, why can’t you say it?
why won’t you declare it?
what holds your yellow-ass back so?
5.
there's a power-burst in the trajectory-whirligig here..
can’t be stopped, won’t be stopped
burnt offering rises up in a scathing-hiss
and exudes such a sweet-cleansing
of
semi-cinnamon and subtle ginger
*and.. love is but a word whose letters
lie
in the sand*
S T – 11 nov 2013
Nov 11, 2013
Nov 11, 2013 at 12:10 PM UTC
We plan, organize, gather and pack,
we fly - what liberty is this - to fly
like a weapon on the edge of heaven.
Having no power to do it ourselves
we trust security, the silver whirligig,
and the immutable laws of lift and ******
Looking down at clouds, near the speed of sound
“Yes, I’ll have the pretzels, please, and a sprite.”
aviating thru the night, a few silent, blinking lights
wedged up in the stars to those stuck in slow cars.
We land with a bump, and reverse engine ******
remaining in our seats until signs are revealed
we then become the many-headed impatience
to exit, to rush - for the baggage we trust
made the journey with us.
Oh, quick, grab a cab, catch a bus
the grumpy, disheveled, six of us
we weary travelers thus
were returned from vacation,
to a near dawn New Haven.
Aug 19, 2022
Aug 19, 2022 at 10:04 AM UTC
Imagine now the room
where stands a vase
on the mantleshelf
its jasmined branch therein
an outstretched arm
reaching beyond itself
for the window where
below in the garden
this ‘Gift from God’
this oleaceae of the olive
trembles
in the crepuscular breeze.
As darkness falls
white flowers descend
whirligig
to the shelf itself
though some fall further:
to the tiled floor
and into a pair
of waiting shoes.
A benediction
on those precious feet
that will,
come morning
as they walk,
release the scent of these
quintessential flowers.
Om rutsira mani prawa taya hung
Sep 19, 2012
Sep 19, 2012 at 1:36 AM UTC
My whirligig giggling and jiggling in an ever gyroscopic balancing act of spotting the to and fro, does sometimes wobble recklessly, even falls down. Revealing, revolving, evolving windy patterns and magnetism that spin pointedly upon an axis of gender nonspecific intention, it gets back up and twirls again. Whirls again, girls again, boys again, toys again, an accelerator from beginning to end, how can I be propellant and then, marry, tie it down? Letting loose these inhibitions of how such a perfect plaything may be too perfect, too divine a contraption is scary whirlwind to put my head around. Yet, this desire to go with it, oscillate and make rounds seems truer than any boxed in version of wooden wouldn't I rathers. So there it is, to grace a pirouette with stable partner, might be a portion of the dance, picturesque, but more ensemble pieces may follow. These too add to the brilliant ballet, and we are in it together.
Dec 30, 2015
Dec 30, 2015 at 12:21 PM UTC
I never understand.
You're a whirligig, spinning this way and that
on the whim of a breeze or a sunray with me
trailing behind
a demented kite catching the flak
picking up the slack while you fly
free
libertad por siempre
at all Costs
come Hellorhighwater
not for you to pick up the flakslack
leave it to your kite demented
I never understand.
Nov 27, 2013
Nov 27, 2013 at 11:02 PM UTC
The collie, fur grayed and patchy, lopes away from his house,
Ostensibly bound for nowhere in particular,
Knowing only that it is that time, his time,
And, as he wanders away for to await that last solitary purpose,
Meanders past a pock-marked and rust-patched single-wide,
Occupied by a young woman (a girl, in truth)
Nursing a newborn, child whose father
Is one in a wide range of unpalatable options.
Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah.
They walk, the residue of some boy meets girl,
Along the quiet main street of an equally quiet town,
Utility poles garnished with benign, contented snowmen,
Low-hung five-pointed auguries strung with tinsel,
Brobodingnagian candy canes swaying rhythmically in the wind.
They have arrived at the unspoken yet mutually understood conclusion
That they have taken their particular accident of birth and geography
As far as such a thing may go, yet they walk hand-in-hand,
Fingers intertwined, though tentatively, in some interim rationale.
Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah.
On a hill above town, there is a rambling, low-slung edifice
Multiple-winged single-story octopus of a house
Well appointed though sparsely and diffidently decorated,
More hotel than home, decidedly transitory in form and function.
In one of the rooms, dimly lit with little ornamentation
Save a Charlie Brown-esque tree squatting forlornly on a bureau,
A woman is reading softly, almost mechanically,
As if it is a story she has read out loud countless times before,
To a man who is heeding, perhaps, though it is clear
That the act is more essential than the words on the page.
They have a daughter who would be there,
Sitting in a chair or on the edge of the bed,
Hands clasped, though in service of or supplication to nothing tangible,
But she is home with her toddler, a whirligig of a child
Who has found some hidden presents
And is tearing away the wrapping from the boxes,
Laughing unrestrainedly as he showers himself
In a red-green-gold ticker-tape maelstrom.
Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah.
Dec 12, 2016
Dec 12, 2016 at 9:05 AM UTC
By some unintentional thievery,
we had a high desert day today,
way out here on the prairie.
Low wind, cooling, and
astonishingly dry.
A blue, deep as high-altitude
cobalt.
Well, almost.
The woman, still no taller
than a child. The brother,
still kind, still stubborn.
Thinking, sometimes out loud,
the memories coming to each
are sometimes the same ones.
A family working together
in the woods they loved.
This younger brother, so
small, smiling to himself
as he carried kindling.
And the quiet brother,
there too, deep thoughts
widening his hazel eyes.
Maple leaves, still green,
and whirligig seed pods,
pile up now in these
brown paper bags.
Sep 12, 2015
Sep 12, 2015 at 11:38 PM UTC
I dread the trek
that takes me down
the whirligig
that spins me round
and round
I’m fastened to my plastic horse
a ripple of fatal
felicity
I fall
but float
my body buoyant
a murmurous being
dissembles my mind
and again with the haunting
the horror
rust eats the bones
moss creeps
consumes
the once proud souls who
no longer grant me
satisfaction
blissful insanity.
now the image
evanescent
my mind unravels
as I grip
my existence
no longer stranded
I am aware
alert
I am alive
Apr 7, 2014
Apr 7, 2014 at 7:08 PM UTC
An eruption of exuberance
To thrill the dawn with light
And dance flowers in the breeze,
Still fresh from the bed's wallow.
To break the snoring drift
Towards the eye glistening moment of waking.
And then all these senses rush at once
To ferret and fidget the confines of my flesh
To dance their whirligig explosions in my blood
With eager threads of excitement pulsing in my skin
To chase the schoolboy morning
beyond the hills
With rattling bicycles on muddy trails.
I stutter out the flush and form in words
Darting thus and fro across the screen
like electric jangling
From the dangling fingers
Wrangling with the hammering keys
As if these magic notions could fluster
Beyond the moments of my joy.
My soul aches to be OUT THERE!
Beyond those moments of joy
Beyond the sleeping bedrooms
Beyond the bicycles
Beyond the hills, and flowers and sky
I want to spiral like galaxies
And dance with planets on the pin cushion dark
Sparkled with stars and clustered nebulae.
I really can’t believe, sometimes,
That all this sense of being
Could be contained in me.
May 19, 2015
May 19, 2015 at 3:36 AM UTC
It's hard to die in springtime,
you know,
But I'm leaving for the flowers
with my eyes closed.
Whirligig birdies, oh you're so cute
you put up a good fight against the wind
blowing at you
Mar 24, 2016
Mar 24, 2016 at 12:50 PM UTC
Nothing more than something to look at
Nothing more than a stake in the ground
Nothing more
than movements in the wind
Nov 5, 2013
Nov 5, 2013 at 9:10 AM UTC
The fly lit on a propellor of
a washerwoman whirligig
watched by a whisky sour wino
wearing a scratchy candied wig
he wondered about a wing-ding
under the comeuppance of rain
we struggle that way
you and I...
like ants burdened with twigs
close the door behind you
walk back in
Aug 24, 2019
Aug 24, 2019 at 9:17 PM UTC
_...summer’s
golden
dance
leaves
me
breathless..._
Apr 26, 2019
Apr 26, 2019 at 11:33 PM UTC
Paint peeling from the window sill
Long legged lady walking,
In such a way
All frail like a mouse without its tail
She wishes not that of a picket fence
But that of lattice.
So that each time she gazes out
Into her garden
She is reminded of bramble pie
Seeing her mothers eyes
Who’s spirit lies in oak
Samaras floating down into her hair
Twirling the whirligig between her fingers
Trailing with gentle fingers
The mid ribs of little sprites wings
Apr 27, 2025
Apr 27, 2025 at 1:08 PM UTC
(a lighter piece sup *** wit tree)
'm, oh yes mud hum,
who hoop fully iz zaftig
and/or mister
Jack Rabbit, whoever wig
gulls or crinkles their nose
creating a lil whirligig
at this bit of flummery unrig
yule lated impossible
to make cogent
and/or tangential with trig
perhaps best red
after taking a swig
of vintage carrot juice with a sprig
of favorite herb, more'n enough
to slake thirsting herd
at the yearly
Peter Rabbit shindig,
which senseless literary rig
ma roll even Bugs Bunny
trump petting donned Taj Mahal
swiftly tailored hare
reed styled periwig,
(would turnip his nose),
button size or overbig,
yet all Joe King aside,
and please do not think me a ****
excepting (Trix are for kids, eh...?)
this intentional faux paw, an
distress signal tis ideally geared
for a Unitarian
herbalist hook can
transform this pro
fessed human imposter,
(who in truth got cursed
as a **** sapien
by Bunny Foo Foo with elan)
particularly in the guise of Han
nub bull the cannibal,
(whose unisexual name Jan)
also doubles up
as my birth month
dwells in Lan
zing, Michigan, and earns
keeps employed as a nan
knee, yet experiences inner pan
dumb moan he yum,
(seized with grippe to dig
in Farmer Brown's garden), and ran
like the dickens
all the way to Tran
sill vane ya leaping
across Atlantic Ocean forced
to adopt the lifestyle of a Van
dull with razor sharp buck teeth.
Jul 27, 2018
Jul 27, 2018 at 1:22 AM UTC
An enamoring dowsabel at Ib's eve
Zion proclaiming 'hosanna'
A peri lifting the anathematization off
The recusant hand of the eternal by
Dinn of God; within a whirligig of death
Rearing the abscence of perfection,
The misforgiving serpent fangs,
The Herald star. The father of lies
Circumscribed: a Dybbuk
By a ghostly tear, the revealer of truth
Upon the brilliance of the inner most
Flame in the mist of the fire entering
The ecosphere subsistent as a profession
Of the faith; to work out ones
Salvation clothed in pain, to console
A mourning soul within the sovereign
Lady to know thyself.
Life a flame of fortune!
ELEETE J MUIR
Aug 24, 2019
Aug 24, 2019 at 9:04 PM UTC
Earth tumbles sideways, and
I lay in heavy snow.
I swallow deep breaths of cold night air.
It is painful to breathe as
I face blue-black sky.
Stars, brightest before dawn,
cluster above me, and
dance like a whirligig.
I wheeze.
I think I am breathing deeply.
I am not.
My ribs feel to bend and crack
and I clutch at my chest, move my arms.
The small exertion does not lift me up,
it does not ease the pain.
Oh, ****
I understand, and I try to call out.
I can make no words,
only a puff of vapor that
dissipates into exposed brick.
What time is it?
I cannot make much sound,
and it is difficult to move.
I wonder when someone will see me.
The arc of the streetlight,
blocked by the maple tree.
I should have cut it down last fall.
Lost to a shade tree?
Marguerite will not wake for an hour.
She will be alright, so will the kids,
families of their own now.
What was that poem?
Third grade, no fourth.
I read it in class.
Billy Herschel hit me with an eraser
when I finished.
The wet snow was too heavy.
I see the plastic shovel
upright in the drift.
Uncle Nick went like this.
Dumb ******* I knew better.
I hear car tires rolling noisily down the street.
I lift a black glove and move my hand.
My ribs stab at me. It is too dark.
I cannot see her. She cannot see me.
I let my hand fall deeply into the snow.
The crystals make their way under my collar.
It is cold, very cold, and it feels good,
keeps me awake, as I feel very tired,
pushed mightily, deeper into the earth.
My watch. I am not wearing a watch.
I will not know what time I will die.
I think to blow puffs of air into the sky,
and I hope that someone
will see the tiny smoke signals.
I smile at the thought.
I hate to dance.
Embarrassed to dance,
embarrassed all my years,
and there is now little time.
I hope there is time.
I am sleepy.
I think of my dog, gone some twenty years.
I see his paws, his gray muzzle, and
his last three breaths.
A single sparrow finds the telephone wire.
It is dawn,
my eyes are closing,
and the dark is warm.
Apr 4, 2018
Apr 4, 2018 at 1:42 PM UTC
Your heart is living in my pulse
Like the chronicler beneath
The thousands of whirligig
Rocky pony necks me
As how the God of time piece
Treasured a tear of grass
Mar 18, 2017
Mar 18, 2017 at 8:17 AM UTC
*Sky seeker , tall wonder with carnation red cloak
Doomed bush vermin , cornered red oaks braced in the treetop shadow
Strolling tearful wire-grass purple meadow
Copper thicket avenues tinged in nutmeg swirl
Mellow voices from the songbird world
Faces within Sugar Pines , white mountains
in Alabama sky , the eye of God in newborn
western twilight , the breath of cool salvation ,
quickening , trembling , addressing , correcting
The door led to the heavens opened , the hall of
our galaxy exposed , the untold wealth of starlight
tending our burden with unrecognized answers ,
the meandering whirligig movements of my time continue predestined*
Oct 20, 2016
Oct 20, 2016 at 12:21 PM UTC
Your hair,
Smelling like the sun...
The taste of sweet summer cherries,
Still dancing in the aroma of your eyes...
And brightly colored lilac curtains in your room ...
putting a glass on your table.
The air,
Moving the clouds in your chest...
The light is on...!
The curtain, allows light to enter...
" My Jasmine...!? "
" I love you..." ( With the sound of laughter ) "
Your voice,
Was a rainbow... 🌈
If the sound was colored...
You are a river...
passing through
my neck...
I have fallen...
Near the daffodil flowers in your eyes...
I will become a thousand small fish...
A thousand trembling goldfish in the pond...
🐟🌊 🐟🐟🐟🌊 🐟🌊
" Oh that blue whirligig!!!
The yellow....!
And the pink one...!
I'm seeing those shiny whirligigs
of your childhood... "
What was the sound of your blowing like?
Your eyes,
giving a thousand colors and memories...
You are floating...
passing through the sound of a woman's laughter...
I will never wear a wedding dress...
To paint on its whites...
I have no child !!!
Oh september!
The end of colored paper...
And the beginning of the blue sun...
You are my mother's breast cancer...
That Growing inside of me...
I thought I was pregnant...
Last night !!!
Touching the curvature of my belly...
From the top of my white knickers
With its bright pink flowers...
When my mother's scarf turns to twenty-nine years old again!
" My Jasmine...?! "
" I love you... "
In illusion,
The voice of a woman...
Calling you...
From afar...
You have reached near the window...
Looking at me...
turning to you...
White lace dress...
Laughter In The Sun....
☀️
From the sound of which woman's laughter, am I reaching to you now?
In your ear,
I become a thousand voices...
The play of the sun's rays, On the tip of my brown ******* getting hot...
Closing my eyes...
I always think If I was blind, How could I understand that the sound of the sea is blue?!
The leaves of the trees are green!?
In glitter...
In the melancholy of the golden leaves of May...
Your face, dancing
Among the glitter of golden winds ...
And the grape leaf,☘
Greeting me...
Thinking of you...
From afar...
How are your hands moving?!
Does my mother's earrings have the yellowness of the sunflowers?
🌻🌻
Every sound,
becoming your voice...
Now...
Cheese crystals...
Pieces of barbari bread on the table...
The pungent odor of tangerine,
In my mother's hands...
And a tomato...
Nov 23, 2021
Nov 23, 2021 at 10:59 AM UTC