Two Poems
Ann Grogan
Used Envelopes
after Emily Dickinson’s envelope poems
Is it not odd
and runs against the blood
that one scrape, one scratch
unattended, loses us an arm?
One feather dropped
shows the lark stopped by,
but with eyes cast down
some never see, or hear her song.
One back turned equals despair,
one frown, a war,
one tick, a fever,
silence, and I forget you care.
Yet one crumb does make a cake,
one hope, a concert pianist,
a dream and then the moon,
next pat my heart and poems bloom.
One waltz, then Brahms sings,
a tiny crack, an open door,
one note, a score,
one tile, a floor,
one stone, a pyramid,
one piece, a suite
one fall to conquer an ice rink.
Diligence is its own glory:
a step, success,
your smile, then music,
and with one new friend
I’m twice blessed.
One thought, you’re back!
One pedal, car drives—
one corner of an envelope
and Emily thrives.
Without Giving Any Reason Whatever
A number of complaints have come to members of Council of negro women who are not at work and who refuse employment when it is offered them, the result being that it is exceedingly difficult for families who need cooks and laundresses to get them. [Some of these women] have flatly refused jobs without giving any reason whatever. –The Greenville News,
October. 2, 1918
She slept in the nude last night outside
under the golden sunflower in full bloom—
fearless as when she leapt the fence
and felt not one thing, though a few barbs
could have pierced her heart.
She walked on water one day:
an easy choice because
there was no other—
like when she danced,
only seemingly by chance.
She painted landscapes on her canvas
caring not if skies were blue;
they came out green
for this Irish lass, alone
in her own dream.
She schemed her way inside the playground,
snuck over walls to play with children,
ride the merry-go-round
despite the sign that
a parent had to be there.
No mother she by choice,
but mothered some,
and sometimes weeping,
often not, got on with life by choice—
without giving any reason at all.
May I reach the purest heaven?
she asked, the closest to prayer she ever came,
then chose justice and not silly hope
that’s just a wisp of smoke
clinging to the coals of fire.
What rules do you play by when it’s over?
Not dread, she replied
as she skydived and yet survived
to sleep outside on another flowered night
and nude—without giving any reason at all.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Ann Grogan is a joyful octogenarian, pianophile, retired lawyer, and emerging poet who lives in San Francisco, CA. Her writing promotes the unequivocal permission to pursue one’s passions at any age. Her poems have appeared in Querencia, Amethyst Review, Shot Glass Journal, Little Old Lady, The Prairie Review, and others. She’s the author of two volumes of poetry, Poetic Musings on Pianos, Music & Life. Her music and poetry website is rhapsodydmb.com.
