Obsequy Carve with rites becoming transmigration through the bardo. A body is carrion. Don an apron. Slice the prescribed pieces. Unbind the shroud before witnesses. Crush the biggish bones. Break the skull. Preserve a namshe's cap; tea cup for the monk. Call them to feed and fill their bowels, leaving the morsels, to drop from the sky. Tell the mourners: It is done. Build an effigy for coded fire. © 2006 E.D.Ridgell ___________________________________________________________ Adzio Lido, pubescent Pole . Depart, dribbling, peeing , cholera on Lubeck gossip. Driftwood! Venice, soddenly Doge. Recede, stinking sinking, prostitute of Paris pillage. Lagoon! © 2005 E.D.Ridgell ___________________________________________________________ In Tandem Go Is change a pylon finite to a pier fickle In tandem to metered time a hand on sickle The progression so constant with end not found? Is change the feckless reckless rhythm unsound To mock in disdain divers worldly endeavors And falsely bestow hope on wants and pleasures? And caught at end of voyage spent and tired, Do we in harbor windless bind the anchor mired to finish wading hard and taxing tests? When through the gate we tricked find no rest Save discover change infinite do we unforeseen In whirlpools transformed accompany time too keen? To catch the sundry glory sunsets fore So warded do we sail afar the tempestuous shore For waiting horizons duly drowning down? A simple prescribed sojourn round and round- Embark from undulating mothers’ slips unkind Do we in tandem go with change and time? © 2005 E.D.Ridgell ___________________________________________________________ The Highwaymen They ride in tandem. The first out the gate, impatient to break ahead, with the other close behind; a chatterbox, to company track turns- round and round, until at the finish line they’re neck to neck to cross at breakneck speed oblivious to the dust. They mean no harm, tandem highwaymen to change and time; the coupled horsemen, eagar for the next race; the robbers’ meet with results the same, one always winning by a nose leaving the shorter footed heralder one step behind. © 2006 E.D.Ridgell ___________________________________________________________	___________________________________________________________ Like ‘Little Sparrow’ Please, please, don’t rehabilitate me, and try to bind this raven’s calls to forms and schemes so like the diagramed sentences exacted on me by the petulant, penguins of St. Bernard’s... padam…padam…padam. I can not conform. I was born to non-conformity. Let me be free to singsong happily rather than to wheeze breathless, dressed frustrated; straight-jacketed in iron, reinforced, and worn, corset-covers... padam…padam…padam. Like ‘Little Sparrow’, I lost a love long ago in one more tempest of life. Disagree if you will but give me my last Olympia, one more song to sing for you before a last shot high into the good night... padam…padam…padam. Spread my broken bits on the Palace Green before I grow Whoof-minded. Let the children run atop me playfully to the sounds of the fifes and drums marching... padam…padam…padam. It is in the poem I can sing to you sweetly or harshly as my intemperate mood swings back and forth to the meanderings of few joys and many sufferings... padam...padam...padam. Remember me for my words, my harmonies, my heart rung meanings, and like Maupassant’s heroine in 'Ball of Fat', do not ridicule or mock my movements to the gentle echos of my archangel’s wings fluttering...padam…padam…padam. © 2007 by E.D. Ridgell
Knitting Needles for a Pouf The marchande de mode, Rose Bertin, has added a pouf to her repertoire at the Grand Mogol. A lady to the Queen was seen on the rue Saint-Honoré heavily burdened with a decision. Was the coming fete to be sentimentalité or a commémorative? Having no clue, she was driven away with two poufs, one for either occasion. A second barouche was needed for the heavy gowns and light frippery that would enhance these; accessories and adornments for a courtly function, dependent upon the mood of Her Majesté. In the mêlée amidst so much commotion a strand of baubles broke to fall and scatter from milady’s fair and powdered neck; seeded pearls of little consequence were cleared from cleavage, floor and seat, clutter tossed from out the carriage windows. That night in the taverns by the Seine there was many a toast in honor of this good lady bought with pledged proceeds of her generosity; Most pawned for cheap wine. One purchased knitting needles. © 2007 by E.D. Ridgell ________________________________________________________	The Last Supper of Aunt Bee Andy finds her half in and half out of the oven, Pantyhose anything but askew. Her feet strew the floor One pointed left and the other heading right, In a proper perpendicular. A paisley dress of a floral barkcloth Testifies that it is a Sunday and that She keeps the faith. The organ Still resonates from this morning’s touch. Her violet-water perfume caresses the air Rising faintly above the scented gas. Atop a Maytag is supper’s faire, Half prepared. The table Is covered with worn linen cloth, Patterned in her favorite roses, Opening on gossamer buds. Beatrice is finished With all the tedious rituals Of sewing bees and church suppers. She leaves her reasons Folded perfectly in a kitchen towel Precisely falling with sides parallel, Hanging from a horizontal bar, Just above the round incised knobs below, One aligned with the rod above, while Ignoring the insistence of the remaining three, And marking the last supper of Aunt Bee. © 2006 by E.D.Ridgell
A Red Maple Leaf [version 111] Who struck you-- Left you to hobble A rain-soaked road? Do black eyes peer From nervous grass? It pains me to pass. Traffic askew, Avoids you. Why care? Is this confusion at pain, Sadness at a wet crosswalk? Each day falls, A red maple leaf. It is innocence Unintended. You, a common goose, The symbol of bliss Are a mother dying. O Canada! © 2006 by E.D.Ridgell Humpty Dumpty Pock marked Sun burnt Hair ablaze Choking on smoke Feverishly Sweating in cracks The Old Ozone Holed Orb Orders Horsemen attack Whimly winds change Waves walk high heeled Hovels into sea Homeless forests flies Leave locusts starving Hordes horde the little left All the kings horses And all the kings men… © 2005 E.D.Ridgell	On the Death of al-Zarqawi Poems are oft times pretty prayers, sweet songs sung for something or to someone; pleas for pity or peace, promissory notes of passion, sign posts to mark starting or parting points. The death of my enemy brings no solace, It is the pendulum of grief homing home to consequences of words and deeds, of clockwork oranges. They are ripening fruit, sprout from the seeds of self fulfilled prophesies. Zionists absent yellow medals, bejeweled within the crescent moon; stand ‘side wavers of the stripes that border pentagon shaped stars on a field of primary blue; both the allies to an amnesic, downing down a street with sewers running red-- all with offerings not pretty. Their words proselytize, spew spite, portend further strife, and ruin the rare opportunity. The children play upon floors of linoleum, marble, and sand, unaware of prejudicial parents, borne on the backs of steely beasts forever cruising warlike clouds amidst the sooty skies. Repetitive wails resonate with the lamentations of grieving participants, rising like dirges sung in an age old sacrificial rite. They sing no lullabies to these babes. Amidst the veiled clouds of universal smoke, their songs are salient sallies of ugly deeds, untempered, unpoetic, and ungodly. © 2006 E.D.Ridgell ___________________________________________________________
The Celestial Serpent Slayer Regal father and king of day emblazzens me with fireworks, hot lit; quick to capture that daughter of the wargoddess on such a bright lit night as this. From blue, green sphere there that lies central to lunar orbit, star gazers watch bemused and dazzled by my trajectory. From out my sling I send a comet to pierce the snake’s eye, meteor to maim a subcircular pupil and lay low the night intruder. In a starry serpent’s realm I fly triumphant. The celestial son silhouetted on the moonlight’s glow, I slay this lunar queen’s tormentor. Daybreak comes to celebrate my valor. A maid is won and turns wanton on the sunrise to ride astride the rising desire of the son of the sun god. © 2007 by E.D. Ridgell	The Box See the box? That is the one. It contains my riddled past, my one and only void. He never liked to fly. On the flight over he was so relieved to have made it safely. No fear, on this flight back. We fear nothing where there is no future. See how gently now they carry him? What use is gentleness now? If only I could feel nothing. If only it were me. The swing in the yard; it grows rusty. It seems like only yesterday he wanted pushing. Don’t offer me condolences .Don’t convey feelings. Relieve me of the shoulder weight so that I may plant this box that contains my riddled past and no future. © 2007 by E.D. Ridgell
A variation on the Ghazal without the radif – instead I’ve put repetition at the beginning line to each couplet. The makhta is retained. I think it gives it an interesting 'ear'. I Am a Room I am a room with one lone chair, The rush of weaver worn with wear. I am a room with rackrent fair For forespent groom like harried hare. I am a room just next the stair An open wound in neon glare. I am a room from window stare, To herald doom and so prepare. I am a room full of despair, In gloom obtuse he pauses there. I am a room caution forbear, And hasten bloom condition rare. I am a room Ed does not dare To assume for him be anywhere. © 2007 by E.D. Ridgell	It is Like “Hoppe Etter Wirkola” A dredging sweat skies down my mug’s lift to leap and freeze dormant in anticipation. In wakes, it awaits an awakening, an uneasy sequel to such coarse caressing. After wintering to whispers, Demeter willingly comes. She brings her burgeoning in with gossamer skins of faintly risen relief, the scoring of thinly grains. Her charms quickly fade and drop upon a rippled sheet, recently white, smoother now from the waxing of my finger scratching. The circumjacent shapes swirl among the veined wings, around her windswept form, falling victim to the bright hot light. Awestruck and wary, with empathy, I rescue her into a cool captured light, snapping her from sight, fixing her, here, immortal. It is like jumping after Wirkola, and I can shoot her no higher. © 2007 by E.D. Ridgell
I am a Strong Mule Deer A rude shard shot through a sunrise’s solitude, shocks and catches me unawares, penetrating my warm, sienna coat, piercing and spurting red its fur: forewarning nothing, no hint to my big ear, no nostril’s intervention; an unforeseen advantage, alacrity, unnatural, attends the surprise. Who ruptures a hart‘s hide, draining it of its liquid too tart to taste, too quick to lick; running down in ruddy falls, downing me down upon the ground in a hush to the dying brush of my black-tipped tail? I am a strong mule deer, whose bleating echoes ever fainter along the canyon’s walls. © 2007 by E.D. Ridgell	Puyi Puyi, Heavenly One; Rising, whithing... morphing. Serpent... celestial and sublime. Manchu! © 2007 E.D.Ridgell ___________________________________________________________