More Spring in Bloom, and Steve Isaak.

I bought Steve Isaak’s new book:  “Can’t Sleep”, poems, 1987-2007 and this is such a dense collection of poetry, I am having to go through it very, very  slowly.

Steve must have made movies before…in a past life, behind some huge camera.  His poetry is like snippets of some dream-movie, but I won’t blow this review right now.  It’s just an issue of so much imagery to plumb and to pack in.  Review to follow next week when I can get a better perspective on this marvelous and first book by a truly original poet.

The pictures are of my back garden….over a fence and archway.  I believe this rose bush…actually two rose bushes, are “Bonicas”…Nope…they are NEW DAWN) .but they might be something else, because they certainly are climbers.  I love pale, pink roses, and these 5 year old plants certainly are giving their all.  They are ‘constant’ bloomers and you only get that by heavy feeding…which I don’t.  I will have to remember to feed them and all the others, because they are such spectacular plants they deserve the effort.

Lady Nyo

Bonica Rose Bush...we think

more of the same bush

more roses

GRAHAM THOMAS

She stood quietly in the garden, dappled sunlight falling like a tattered golden veil, crushing a Graham Thomas in her hand.  The silky texture slipped through long, bony fingers. A seductive perfume carried upwards, the feel of the petals reminiscent of something she vaguely remembered in the past.

Yes, she remembered now.  It was her sex, soft and puffy, with powdered lips awaiting the frisson of arousal. The man who once kissed those lips was long dead, a pale ghost to her memory.

A tower of rose heads nodded their encouragement.  They watched her season after season, the cycle of bush-life matching her own. Grown thin during the years, all gnarled canes beneath and gall, too. Within years both had become feeble. Soon the bush would cover her grave, dropping its petals in remembrance until it, too, faded from earth.

Now Graham Thomas was pleading to cover her mound with his perfumed beauty. He would nestle within the deserted folds of her abandoned sex. He would make her juicy again.

He promised to leave the thorns on the bush.

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2008