Sample Poems by Marjorie Power

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In the Garage

Big, like a football player.
He’s here for my donation
to the Children’s Home,
an elliptical trainer he hefts
into the bed of his pickup.
His hand clasps mine,
the shake an engulfment.
His name’s the same
as my brother’s,
the one killed
when I was a child.
A name lodged
between heart and gut.

His handshake stops time.
It’s a lifting-out-of,
placing me in a world
where my brother moves,
AIDS has died off,
and there’s silence
in the Gaza Strip, broken
by birdsong.

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Resting on the Couch

She lies entirely
on the left side of my chest,
little pink legs tucked up,
head turned sideways.
Fashionistas covet hair like hers,
flaming red tufts
that catch the light
and point everywhere.

She dozes comfortably
atop my reconstructed breast.
I’ve begun thinking of it
as an art purchase
that’s wearing well.

Such quick, determined breathing.
My granddaughter!
I with no sister,
niece, female cousin
or daughter of my own.

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Spring Dusk, Yachats

The salal blooms –
pale pink droplets on red stems.
Its leaves go gray with fungus.
My cousin, too, is uniquely
beautiful and unhappy.

If you love someone
who has everything
but still sounds hollow,
after sunset listen only to the ocean.
Gather shadows.

Try a narrow path
used by rabbits and deer.
Disappear among shore pines
and Sitka spruce. Be your absence.
Be present to that.

Return to the beach
where the ocean grows dark
and the tide delivers your name.
Where the hollow might stroll
and the new moon rises.

Along the rocky trail,
a blast of fragrance
offered by wild roses
while their cultivated sisters
sleep, snug in green’s dark core

 

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Fear


To fear is to stand
at a bedroom window
early in the morning
and hesitate
to raise the blind.

Once it’s up
you see February sky
that begins to show color.
The sparkle of branches,
roof tops, fence posts.
Winter heather,
purplish pink blooms
grown plump.
A cloud of a cat

models perfect indifference
and still, you can’t
welcome the view.

To fear is to fail
to confide in a friend
when any would offer support.
It’s to stand at a window
and watch snow melt,
then go on watching.