Measured by Song

God Gave a Crow a Piece of Cheese; He Turned Around and Gave Me These

Sally Cook

Measured by Song

Sally Cook

Copyright © 2005 by Sally Cook

Grateful acknowledgement is made to
the following journals, in which some
of these poems were first published:

Pivot
Iambs and Trochees
The Neovictorian/Cochlea

Published by The New Formalist Press

XHTML & CSS design by Leo Yankevich

Invisibility

She used to think her sole and starring role
Was set within a sparkling social life,
Gadding about from one new watering hole
To others, and so many of them rife
With famous folk, who’d often sink a knife
Into the next one’s bright ballooning talk.
She lived an arty and ambitious life,
Exceeding pace, and walked the fastest walk
Until her natal stars began to balk
And planetary aspects swayed and bent.
Then, though she’d preen herself each time, and stalk
All those on greater, higher planes, who went
Floating on gilded feet upon the air,
Arrows brushed past her, she was unseen there.

The Philanderer’s Plant

Dull and morose, and intellectual,
You loved both plants and poetry; we took
This as the truth. An ineffectual
Light shone on your face; a holy look.
So, through the years, we waited for your book,
Sure you were writing it; for after all
What other goal was yours? Of course, you shook
Yourself free, when the timing of a call
From any woman came too often. Tall
Tales of conquest on your lips, recited
To friends warmed you instead. And in the fall,
New bars, new girls; no poetry. Excited
And pumped up by your potency, you lied.
Your plant, deprived of water, slowly died.

Grace Sustained

Dear Edna—a drink, a joke, and then some gossip
Were all she had to help sustain her dreams.
Late evenings, when she’d had a little sip
Or two, a roast in, news on, then her screams
Were far more silent, and on lesser themes.

She asked the Deity if he would let up
On her. But as it didn’t seem bright beams
From Heaven were ever going to fill her cup,
She figured then perhaps she’d shock, disrupt;
Wearing a naughty suit for Halloween,
Staying up late, complaining of the pup
Next door, and being brash—a bit obscene.

Frightened and old, and going blind, and frantic;
Her bravery showed itself in every antic.

Evening Vegetables

Broccoli, bent upon a checkered cloth,
Lies safe and silent. Cauliflower sits
Along with jeweled fruits. And then a moth
Crowds stars in corners, clouds the table, flits.
A gentle glider, not a bomber. Nits
Compose a hymn for vegetables. A wing
Floats silent through; one reedy voice emits
Its harmony to evening. Everything
Lies ripening in a heap; begins to sing
Together, praising life. Their quarrels long past,
Each knows the ever constant, circling ring
Of seasons that will be, have been. At last,
Sensing the world revolves, completes, then blends,
The message of each vegetable ends.

The Professor of Art

That moment in the studio when you
Pinned all the drawings up, then pulled them down
Except for two, then, hunched and grim, gave due
To these, your face pulled in a grumpy frown.

As in the final inning on the mound,
You pitched a hard fast ball straight through, and said
“Those two might have a shot at some renown;
All others might as well have stayed in bed.”

In this repressive jungle where we’re led
Today, I am quite sure you would be sued
For messing with a tender student’s head
And being sexist, racist, surly, rude,

And banned from teaching anything that’s true.
Yet thanks to you, I painted and I drew.

You’ve Got Me…

A feminist decided that her skin
Was more important than the clothes she wore,
For after all, those garments she was in
Censored her style, restricting more and more;
And painting portraits would be such a bore.

A fine symbolic statement must be made,
Revealing how didactic at the core
Good clothes could be, and so she made the trade

And shucked the silly garments girls adore,
Then hung her skin upon a gallery’s walls;
A woman with a hyperbolic roar,
Upon whose ears no other music falls.

Those passing noted just how equalized
She now appeared, and how her hide was prized.

Going to India

To see the child she helped, she planned a trip
To India, and thought, while she was there
A yellow printed bedspread would just fit
Within her carry-on, but to be fair

To all that she believed, she priced them first
In catalogs and in the gift shops too
And found the lowest prices, and the worst;
Averaged them out, as prudent shoppers do;

No one would cheat her in some far bazaar.
Those parents didn’t need to know her name,
Only the given one, for people are
Known to want money from you—such a shame.

Behind the walls of her five-star hotel,
Protected, she could only wish them well.

Blossoming

Pale flowers, frozen there upon the paper,
Within an arcane, glittered, tinfoil room.
Weight of her husband’s crucifix had shaped her
Even then. She withdrew to a tomb
Of choice, glanced at her image there, and saw
A life horrific, yet quite powerless.
The world seemed only cold, and sharp, and raw.
She felt the pressure to conform, address
Her horoscope, for only that could save her;
The Cross could not, nor any other icon,
But planets in their journey made her blood stir
Those oracles one could depend upon.

Small symbols lined on paper on a table,
She followed them, as soon as she was able.

Ex-Wife’s Apology

Sorry I wasn’t able to be more
To you than I was then, those years ago.
Our motives, cold and cramped, were there before
The rent within me had begun to show.
How dark and narrow my heart was; a door
I used to keep the light, affection out.
That’s right, that’s all you were, a balm for sore
Feelings. And so, I followed you about,
Wearing boy’s clothing, flinging paint and clout—
I almost tried to be you, though I knew
Your dirty words, your attitude, the shout
Forced all your inner pain on me. And you
Didn’t help much, counting peas at dinner;
A husband’s proper share. Who was the winner?

A Sacred Cow in the Office

What strange laws there are now, that would encourage
A larder at her desk, where she just fits.
Junk food awaits the moment when she’ll forage,
To add more to those grotesque layers. It’s
The carbs and starch that wedge her, she admits,
And knows within that she’s a giant mess.
Though under flab and heavy strides, there sits
A lady , lithe, a fine adventuress
Screaming to get out, sway in a red dress,
Make mad love, sing songs under starry skies,
Forget the cheesey snacks and soda; stress
Herself in midnight clubs with handsome guys.

Political correctness locks her there—
An honored victim, glued upon her chair.

Another Species

Each time you felt some shame you could confess
Those sins you had committed, but, instead,
You whispered a revision, something less,
In someone’s ear in yet another bed.

That is to say you were quite off your head,
And took it out on everyone you knew.
Your failings never flagged; your heart seemed dead
As each sly dance of courtship went askew.

Tangled and driven, thoughtless, always you
Would promise all, returning nothing much
But pain. Still, there were those quite eager to
Receive this bounty, once your fickle touch
Had been desired. Fat, balding, only then
Too late you wept for things that might have been.

As It Is Bent

So cold, so hard, you own all you survey—
At least you think you do, though I recall
The times we dreamed of some far, future day
When we’d be older. In the drafty hall
The Virgin Mary watched, we’d see her face;
Madonna of the Chair was present where
We made our dash across that frigid space
With stones hot from the coal stove squatting there
In the square dining room, where we had studied;
Wrapped up in newsprint they would warm each bed.
I think of careless clumsy boots, flung, muddied,
And of the simple, even lives we led.
I wonder where that child in glasses went,
And how the twig grew twisted, old, and bent.

The Musician

My photos show her with her violin,
Small, golden-haired; angelic, some would say.
Much later, overweight, still fey, she’d spin
While playing, and then grin, hair short and grey.
Time halted. Wrapped in music she might stay
With us always, casting her wondrous spell
From that stringed wooden box. But one stark day
Her head bent under heavy clouds and fell.
Nerves, legs failed first, then speech—yet every hell
Was one that she could conquer, it would seem.
She strained against the awful Thing to quell
Its iron grip. With none to hear her scream
Or catch her, hear her fading notes, her wishes.
She dropped—propped at the sink, and washing dishes.

All Are Numbered

Moving along the narrow grassy rows
Under a sherbet sky, time seems to be
The only place where nothing ever grows
Or dies, and grass remains, eternally
Quite clipped and orderly. It truly shows
That someone, somewhere, sometime gave it care.
Each blade of landscape preens itself, and knows
Whatever it may know. And we compare
The picking of the fellow on the stair
Playing what he calls oiling music, slow,
To lengthening of grass; the mower’s snare
Is measured by the song. We’ll come and go,
Yet always will this perfect moment stay;
A timeless mowing tune, an hourless day.

About the author

Sally Cook’s writing and painting have always nourished each other. Her poems have been published in many journals. Her paintings have been widely represented, most notably in the Tenth Street Cooperative galleries and The William H. Littlefield Collection at Harvard University. Among her scholarships and awards was a grant to explore the work of Emily Dickinson and T. S. Eliot This research resulted in a series of portraits of Emily Dickinson. The ideas which led to these paintings have been explored in “The International Emily Dickinson Journal” and in the book “Double Vision—Contemporary Artists Look at the Poetry of Emily Dickinson”. A detail of a self portrait, inspired by Chekov’s “An Artist's Story”, illustrates these poems.