USA

sparrowsongs@earthlink.net

Crisis Counselor

She was a coat of arms 
seasoned for the job -- tough
and polished like tortoise shell.
When the women were tougher,
she'd tuck her advice-giving head
back against the executive chair,
let them try to fluff bent feathers,
watch them falling to their feet.
Then, her little turtle arms
would stretch out across the desk;
try to float a form --
a restraining order, maybe
a list of early warning signs --
but they'd keep on sleeping, sleep
hard through the sessions she'd spend
blowing on plastic ships, paper sails
rarely reaching port, and they would cry
like little children watching helpless,
dazed as she sunk their dreamboats, 
sat on them, no coming up for air.  
And perhaps she'd think of the little turtles 
we'd kept confined to bathtubs as kids,
or of the public safety commercials
telling mother how, if she turned her back,
we could fall to sleep, slide and drown
in barely an inch of sitting water.

beach,stones

1

gathered stones
from a long beach
carried them on backs
home
released them 
in a crystal bowl
to wash the sediment away

2

when dry
some stones
lose their beauty
water
refill the bowl
it's a lost path
back to that beach

3

sift the stones again
some are beautiful
mixed 
among the lifeless
lift the heavy bowl
relocate
to a safer place

4

outside the room
discuss the stones
in a fountain
they'll make
some day
first there is work
and rest

5

on a dusty floor
spread out
from the thick glass bowl
gone asleep on one side
mouth open
drooling stones
trying to creep away

6

the next month
he sees
asks about the stones
she says
yes
they must have fallen
i don't know why

7

the silence 
deaf mute
as planted stones
his
the porous sand
inside a turning beach
made of her

Analogy

There's a six-inch ornamental fish in my freezer.
I wrapped it in plastic and put it there
in a paper bag.    It died
over a year ago. 

What do you do when someone you love (and feel
bad about keeping) leaves -- when you discover
him floated away:  blank-stared, stiff-
bodied, doesn't know you're there.

I never considered leaving it there, topsy-turvy,
daze-faced, lifeless in the tank,  just because
it _used_ to flutter up to me when I got home, 
get excited at the sound of my voice, eat 
straight out of my hands.

Guilt keeps me from throwing it away,
denial won't let me bury it.

"Analogy" was first published in Unlikely Stories

Three Seasons

I

Her body was a snowflake caught mid-fall.  
She popped herself into her mouth and pressed
herself beneath the tongue to stop a consummation 
with the ground.  Her body was its own frozen rain.

II

Her body was the flour poured from grain
colored sacks, for the sake of a picnic
and its three-legged race.

III

Her body broke its husk. The husk 
became a cast she fills with burning.

("Three Seasons" first appeared in Conspire)

© All Copyright, 2000, C. J. Sage.
All Rights Reserved. Printed By Permission.