LET IT BE… SPRING
THE WCC POETRY CLUB
Let It Be . . . Spring is a publication of the WCC Poetry Club, Washtenaw Community College, Ann Arbor, Michigan. This issue was produced on a PC using Microsoft Publisher. Fonts used include Arial Black and Lucida Bright. Design and layout by Tom Zimmerman. Reproduced by the WCC Copy Center. Copyright Š 2015 the individual authors and artists. The works herein have been chosen for their literary and artistic merit and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Washtenaw Community College, its Board of Trustees, its administration, or its faculty, staff, or students.
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WCC POETRY CLUB Meetings are in the Writing Center, LA 355 Fridays @ 5 pm in Fall & Winter Fridays @ 1 pm in Spring/Summer All Welcome tzman@wccnet.edu http://wccpoetryclub.wordpress.com
The Huron River Review WCC’s Award-Winning Literary Magazine Seeks Poetry, Fiction, Nonfiction, Artwork, & Photography Open to submissions from September through January hrr@wccnet.edu http://thehuronriverreview.wordpress.com 2
LET IT BE… SPRING A WCC Poetry Club Anthology Edited by Tom Zimmerman Contents—Words Tyler R.Wettig Lawrence Moebs Kay Sanders Diane M. Laboda Sheldon Ferguson Lylanne Musselman Ayowole Oladeji Tom Zimmerman
New Prophets Two Real Loves Spring Aeschylus Reluctant Spring Springing Two Haiku and a Tanka Language of Fire Lost Season Glow of Spring For the Love of Spring The Season
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Contents—Images Tyler R. Wettig Tom Zimmerman Lylanne Musselman
Front Cover 4, 9, 13 Back Cover
And in my hour of darkness She is standing right in front of me Speaking words of wisdom, let it be —The Beatles
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TYLER R. WETTIG New Prophets In that we are always preparing to be happy, it must never be that we are so. – Blaise Pascal, Pensées My muse wore a halo of thorny wildflowers and smiled faintly— walking on wet leaves, speaking in lotus tongues, reciting surahs to my soul I once followed her to the fifth circle where the hills had eyes and the walls talked: no longer a distinction between church bells ringing and bottles clanging And when the meek not the weak grew wary I carried her cross through the reddening dusk where the bruised and bleeding became new prophets.
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LAWRENCE MOEBS Two Real Loves Two real loves in my life So far One dead and one missing But living still I presume. If I had to guess, I’d say by the side of a lake Or maybe only near a lake On a dead end private road. Body shaken, lurching, daily, Driving in his rusted pickup truck or work van Over loose gravel and potholes Full of muddy water, or dust. Each jarring, gut-shaking dip and hole Adding to the accumulation of wrinkles On a face I will always remember as smooth.
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LAWRENCE MOEBS Spring I think it was the great scientist, Euripides, Two millennia ago, More than two millennia ago Two and a half millennia ago, at least, Who first listed, Broke down and elucidated, Brought to light, This list of simple machines: The lever, The wheel and axle, The pulley, The inclined plane, The wedge, The screw, And the spring. The machine: any device where energy is input and converted to do work, to displace an object, to have an effect… I and I have been effect-less, ineffective, non-working, a poor machine As I’ve tried to leverage against competing forces; As you’ve pulled away And it became plain That the wedge being driven between was insurmountable, irreparable. I and I have been a poor machine While the days have grown Beaten down by darkness since the solstice And steadily growing until its point of balance To its tipping point. “And Springtime will really hang you up the most.” And Spring is here 7
KAY SANDERS Aeschylus Where now is Spring? The buds upon the trees Have yet to open, to even be. Demeter still a dirge sings. The lyrics only known to Those who understand her mystery. Persephone living in the darkness Guarded by Cerberus with no escape. Can Hades be a happy home With death as a dark husband? Pomegranate seeds or freedom? You did not know the answer. So now in tragic script Writes he who also knows The tragic. A mystery forever Hidden by the heights of Eagles flying.
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DIANE M. LABODA Reluctant Spring Spring is cowering under a rock, I know it is. She’s afraid to show her face, so clad in icicles as she is—just like the wounded maples in my front yard with little beards of sap caught between 50 degrees and the freezing cold of night. I’d like to turn over the rock, an easily split shale, and coax Spring out, wrap her in a blanket and cardinal feather boa, comfort her with promises of sunny-warm breezes and a ticket to the season opener. I understand Spring’s reluctance, a little like failure to thrive, not wanting to sing too early and lose one’s voice, jump up too early and miss the mark, grow too early and be stunted by old man winter’s icy winds. Spring just needs a reason to cheer up and stop hiding, a reason to follow the wicked winter we’re so tired of, show us some grass, bring up the tulips whose upstart leaves are trying hard to understand white fluffy rain. Spring, by name only, will come— so says the batboy, the gullible tulips, the songbirds whose voices are hoarse for trying to woo, and the optimistic gardener sharpening his hoe, and counting his seeds, row by row.
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DIANE M. LABODA Springing It occurred to me today that we run half-on half-off the ground. We are half grounded, half taking flight— accumulating brief moments when neither foot is on the path. It occurred to me today that each tiny fragment of levitation, however small, can collectively become a letting-go, a relinquishing of the certainty our foothold provides, relinquishing the certainty of knowing everything. And should we choose to, we can take flight—remembering each letting go and come nearer to the treetops as they brush the clouds, nearer to the clouds as they dissolve into the sky, nearer to the sky as it reflects the divine.
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SHELDON FERGUSON Two Haiku and a Tanka Canada geese soar through camelot blue sky honking loudly * Cold, cold spring day snow sprinkles through chilly breeze * Squirrel scales up an oak tree like a mountain spring air sweeps the land under camelot blue sky in pine wooded forest
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LYLANNE MUSSELMAN Language of Fire A whiff of hickory— Bonfire flames crackle, spit bright sparks— like calculated words can sting or comfort and warm. Circling in air, a red-tailed hawk riding a thermal, glides without worry of the correct verb to carry it home.
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LYLANNE MUSSELMAN Lost Season In class, a student said she read: flowers in our normal planting zone may not grow here anymore due to climate change. Goodbye bright daffodils and glowing crocus. We in the Midwest will soon lose our beautiful spring season. It will be foreign before too long. Lost to an ignored war: pollutants versus complacent humans who boast an unsuspecting nature. This spring it’s done nothing but shower—rain or snow. On days we get sun the wind whips tree branches in threats and warnings. It’s nearly April’s end, trees are barely budding, it’s not even 40 degrees, and meteorologists are forecasting snow showers again.
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AYOWOLE OLADEJI Glow of Spring The day begins to fade Darkness approaches from the high sky Pitch as black everything darkens Even the eyes can’t see anything Suddenly day breaks free Bright sunny light appears From the hidden clouds Colors of the trees Begin to change colors Leaves shedding on the ground Bright and lovely Glow of spring cherishes the moment
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AYOWOLE OLADEJI For the Love of Spring Love of spring brings memories Beyond the heart and soul Feeling the warm sun Overflowing with the sensation of love Lying on the sandy beach Comfy and cozy Smiles of day and laughter Enjoying the peace of spring love Observing the sunset bliss Hovering over the blue sky Watching the waves flow like spring light
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TOM ZIMMERMAN The Season You kiss her breasts, her belly, move on down, while Schumann’s First is on the stereo, galumphing where it ought to pirouette, and breath and blood thump, Lover, give me life. And later, in the woods, your senses drown in earth-squelch, musk of last year’s leaves, the glow between the branches, smell of her still wet. But that was dreams ago, the thought a knife, survival tool for when she’s gone, when you carve out a place, rough-hewn at first, the raw space strong but awkward, coltish, pale as dew. But time will darken it with rain, crow-caw, whatever you create, whatever burns electrically, in hell, till she returns.
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Now do a choir of chirping minstrels bring In triumph to the world the youthful Spring. —Thomas Carew The bright eyes of song sparrows sitting on spotted eggs Peer restlessly through the light and shadow Of all Springs. —Amy Lowell Spring comes little, a little. All April it rains. —Anne Stevenson April is the cruellest month, breeding Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing Memory and desire, stirring Dull roots with spring rain. —T.S. Eliot To what purpose, April, do you return again? Beauty is not enough. —Edna St. Vincent Millay The shadows have their seasons, too. —John Updike in Justspring when the world is mudluscious the little lame balloonman whistles far and wee —E.E. Cummings Nothing is so beautiful as Spring – When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush; Thrush’s eggs look little low heavens, and thrush Through the echoing timber does so rinse and wring The ear, it strikes like lightnings to hear him sing —Gerard Manley Hopkins I’ve planted vegetables along each garden wall so even if spring continues to disappoint we can say at least the lettuce loved the rain. —Lisa Olstein your secret belief in perpetual spring, your faith that for every hurt there is a leaf to cure it. —Amy Gerstler And I, what fountain of fire am I among This leaping combustion of spring? —D.H. Lawrence
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FERGUSON LABODA MOEBS MUSSELMAN OLADEJI SANDERS WETTIG ZIMMMERMAN WCC POETRY CLUB