by Ethel Mortenson Davis
Blackberry moon,
moon of the blackberry month,
snags at me,
rips at my skin.
Star-gazers come
and get caught
in her sweet clutches,
but are overtaken
by a storm
with brittle, scratchy fingers
of lightning
that blackens out the moon.
Now we must wait
for the harvest moon
as she ripens
on top of the waters.
Note: This is Ethel’s contribution to the moon-night organized by Francha Barnard and Write-On Door County.
Filed under Ethel Mortenson Davis, poems, Poetry
a villanelle by Thomas Davis
“Beside the cottonwood,” I start to say.
She looks at me. Words fade out of my head.
What now? I think. I focus on the way
She’s standing by the massive tree, the gray
Streaked through her hair a halo that has wed
Her essence to the glinting interplay
Of light and shadow dancing leaves that sway
And flutter in a breeze that seems to tread
Out from the tree into the fields of day.
The sudden silence morphs into dismay,
Confusion, even, maybe, just a hint of dread.
What if, inside a moment, disarray
Has somehow found our lives and cutaway
The passion in our hearts that’s always led
To moments that are glorious and fey.
But then she smiles. The tree’s roots dig through clay
And living sustenance flows to the spread
Of branches reaching to the sky, the play
Of light her spirit as my spirit’s quay.
Filed under poems, Poetry, Thomas Davis
by Ethel Mortenson Davis
I keep looking
for the breathing holes
beneath this thick sea ice,
a place where
I can propel
up towards the light,
grasping for a breath of air
that smells like earth
and soil and green things.
I keep looking
for that rare space
because I cannot hold
my breath much longer.
There. Over there
I see some light
through honey-colored ice.
Filed under Ethel Mortenson Davis, poems, Poetry
pastel by Ethel Mortenson Davis
Filed under Art, Art by Ethel Mortenson Davis, Ethel Mortenson Davis
by Thomas Davis
from a new play that I am writing:
Reality dips, swirls, a dance,
a pirouette, a song, a trance,
and as the mist of being drifts
a chord is struck, and what is shifts,
and fate becomes a puzzle box
secured by puzzles that are locks—
And so reality becomes
a whisper, shadow that benumbs
the heart and changes what will be
into a storm-tossed, dicey sea.
Filed under poems, Poetry, Thomas Davis
photographs by Ethel Mortenson Davis
Blue Mesa Reflection
Cliff Near Ouray
Outside the Cabin Where We Stayed
Filed under Ethel Mortenson Davis, Photography
photograph by Ethel Mortenson Davis
Filed under Ethel Mortenson Davis, Photography, Uncategorized
by Ethel Mortenson Davis
The young father
bound
his newborn daughter
across his chest
and then slipped on his skis.
This was a cold February
in the land of lakes and trees
with dancing green lights.
Here he connected,
just as his ancestors
before him connected,
to the starry night,
just as his daughter
will someday bind
her infant
across her heart,
presenting a new life
under the milky-green
foam of stars,
under the great tail
of the Milky Way Galaxy
above her shoulders.
Filed under Ethel Mortenson Davis, poems, Poetry
by Thomas Davis
The edge where sanity and fear collide
Whirls passions that are uncontrollable
Into events that spark events that tide
Across the barriers of shores and scull
Destruction, pestilence, a flood of woe
Fermented in assumptions drawn from trials
That litter through all human lives and flow
Like water over hopes, beliefs, denials,
And on the edge, in ferment’s shifting shape,
Decisions ratchet back and forth; dreams lure
The spirit as dire consequences scrape
Against the future suddenly obscure
Enough to paralyze the strength from hands
That long to civilize the hinterlands.
Filed under poems, Poetry, Thomas Davis
by Ethel Mortenson Davis
One
became caught
last night
in my net.
This morning
I untangled him —
eyes true and bright,
magnificent iridescent feathers,
and a warm beating heart
that stayed in my hand
as I threw him up into the air
so he could
continue his flight
across the universe.
Filed under Ethel Mortenson Davis, poems, Poetry, Uncategorized
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