POETRY PAGE
The 2024 Wine Tasting & Poetry event took place on Saturday, May 18th, where six poets wrote one or two poems inspired by one of the artworks featured in the Hope Lives: Art for ALS exhibition.
Detasseling by Amanda Moore
after “Harvest” by Scott Craig
July in the cornfield: pay
was good, work hard. Just 16 & up before dawn, we
rode five in the back & four
up front, bodies pressed
tight, air thick
with dew that soaked our clothes ‘til midday sun burned
& sometimes our shirt sleeves steamed. Layers kept sharp leaves from slicing bare skin
as we moved down
each row, leaving
the fifth intact, its untouched tassels effervescent. We knew
our task if not our purpose,
how to grab the silk & yank
it off, a single, pleasing motion. On the flatbed or in the mud we worked in the tension of the natural world:
all sex, this naked pollination. Sweat & lemonade on our lips, sweet fatigue by end of day,
a languid, buggy dusk
that carried us
back home to sleep & do
it all again.
By the time
husks began to toughen
& skies laid out a blue so deep it seemed an ocean,
we were gone, the work
of the combine left to those
who lived to run it, who worried all year about yield. Sweet corn from the store, 12 ears
for a dollar & served
slathered in salty butter
was as distant from my work
in the field as paper shuffled
in an office in the city
or soft serve pulled
in the Dairy Queen at the edge of town. It was seed corn we detasseled, hybrids
not for eating, bred only
to plant again in spring, a thing as far away from us as heaven.
"Harvest," 36 x 24 x 1.5 inches, Dirty oil, ArtSet on iPad, EyeGaze on a TD Pilot printed on canvas
"Time Is Limited," 24 x 20 x 1.5 inches, oil on canvas by Ken Brenner (in collaboration with Octavio Molina)
Time is Limited
by Judy Halebsky
after Ken Brenner & Octavio Molina's painting
fat shiny tubes of ochre
squeezed from the bottom into flares
of orange and dandelion
let it be May, let it be June
I'll sink my boots into snowmelt grass
stomp in the mud through Keji trails
let my last day be / time as a drink
a drug, a prayer — keep singing
let it be May
let it be June
"The Universe," 8 x 8 x 1 inches, mixed media & gold leaf, chalkboard paint on panel by Sandra Murphy-Pak
Filament
A Poem by Dean Rader, After Sandra Murphy-Pak, The Universe
I woke
this morning thinking
about the universe
which is not the same
thing as the
universal and how
I prefer the former
even more than
Das All German
as in all which is
a lot pretty much
everything not
unlike the human
brain which I see
in the painting the
swirls and lobes and
pons what do the angels
see through the optic
chiasm and God’s
medulla oblongata
and I wonder
as I always do
what great space
what emptiness what bright
darkness is being thought
into being?
Centrifugal, Mineral by Rebekah Wolman
after The Universe, foot painting by Sandra Murphy-Pak
the moment of beginning is molten
momentum flinging the verse
in universe begins in spinning
heavy elements in stellar dust
flung flying fused pooled
golden in earth's core earth's heart
years of flood years of drought
imprinted rippling in whorls
of wood decaying under weight
of weather's hoofprint cells
replaced by silica crystallized
as quartz carbon manganese
iron saturated paintbrush swoops
swirls traces circles wanders
infinite beyond beginning
Burning Love (Artist: Brandy Trigona)
A poem by Kim Shuck
Sometimes you find your
Initials in a thing you might have thought
Unaware of you
Reflected vibration
There are so few things that
Sing songs down to world connections
Stuff of creation
Staring over the edge
Into the eyes of original thought
Might find them smiling.
"Burning Love," 12 x 12 x 1 inches, bite switch drawing on iPad printed on aluminum, by Brandy Trigona
"Sail On," 12 x 18 x 1 inches, photograph printed on aluminum, by Michelle Bianco
43º37'23'' N. 70 º12'28'' W
by Rebekah Wolman after Sail On, a photograph by Michelle Bianco
What registers: nest of rock sheltering the Keeper's
triple-chimneyed red-roofed house, outbuildings attached
and huddling against the broad base of the tall lantern-topped cone
of white-painted rubble-stone—the lighthouse anchoring the eye
against cloud-veiled sky. Ripples tickle tide-tarred rock.
Scant breeze flaps the flag trapezoidal. Weathered layers
of rock reach beyond the photo's edge—visible sign
of invisible ledge that carpets the floor of Casco Bay
with hazards, remnants of volcanoes here before
dinosaurs, surfacing as islands you skirt sailing in.
Now, you're out there, 24 nautical miles from shore.
What registers: water, wind, wheeling gulls, swooping terns, salt spray,
creaking mast, luffing sail. A flash of light crowns the horizon, four
seconds wait and flashes again—the beam you call
Light-my-way-home tendering promise of safe passage
into the Bay. The light on Halfway Rock flashing red.
Double white flashes from Ram Island Ledge.
Foghorns every ten seconds, every fifteen, two blasts
every thirty. Closer in is Alden's Rock. You try not to think
about the steamship Bohemian's hull torn ragged
on a February night in 1864, Cape Elizabeth light in view
but distance skewed by weather and 42 lost overboard.
Finally, the sloping rocks of Portland Head where the Annie C.
Maguire ran aground in a Christmas Eve blizzard, 1866.
What registers: Keeper rescuing captain and crew.
Now, below its pulsing beam, the lighthouse takes its form again,
stolid stone cone that keeps its promise, welcomes you home.
"Atmosphere," 8 x 8 x 1 inches, foot painting, mixed media and chalkboard paint on panel, by Brandy Trigona
I Am Compelled to Create the Circle
by Sarah RosenthalI
I am compelled
pull, sweep, avalanche
names and stories
the troposphere’s ash and dust
taxing and strenuous
branch, roar, stream
locate sky diagrams
silver-blue night glow
start mixing color
drag, swim, catapult
through layers of burn and freeze
above the stratosphere
I’ve always danced
bend, flex, wriggle
merge with matter
after "Atmosphere" by Sandra Murphy-Pak
of shooting stars
I landed here
flicker, drift, ripple
awash in bluegreen auroras
stretch through the thermosphere
on a black background
squirm, surge, deluge
what wants to be known
above the exopause
to create the circle
slither, burn, float
apply the paint
Eclipse (Artist: Brandy Trigona)
A Poem by Kim Shuck
Parts of the body
Out of the light
Grow cold but know
Know that the light will come again
Ours is a connection of
Disconnection a
Slipping between a
Hide and seek an
Emergence
"Eclipse," 12 x 12 x 1 inches, bite switch drawing on iPad printed on aluminum, by Brandy Trigona