Stefanie Bennett- Two Poems

THE MEMENTO... THE MOUNTAIN of SUNS...     

 

‘..... But whenever there’s a snatch of talk/it turns to the Kremlin

Mountaineer./He pokes out his finger/& he alone goes boom –.’*

                       [Osip Mandelstam]

 

You are...

               Still living in dank gratis

                            Sabbath Lands –.

The graticule

               Magnetizes

                            That Parthian dynasty.

And, the Arsacids*

               Once stoned with

                           The morphology of age

Rise, inexorably again,

               To the old

                           Humanistic order.*

 

The blacksmith’s lame

               Enough –; he walks

                           His orthopaedic curse.

The ferryman’s

               Witnessing another pre-dawned

                           Cult of the dead.

Women; children;

               Toss their loaded

                           Dream-scream dice as

Colchis trembles*

               Its blue acetylene ray

                           To the throb of a quartz lamp.

 

I wear the rose monocle

              Of reportage.

                           Add my own salamandering:

Stark yellow...! Black...!

             My fingerprints smudged, denailed

                           By Muscovite wine.

No. Not even ascetic heroism

             Can condone

                           A one eyed troika mongering

While all and sundry

            Wear the branded

                          Goatskin lead-boot and cap.

 

There’s three copecks worth

            Of sound

                         Forbidden your lips,

Enough to purchase

            The ingredients

                        For cabbage and mutton soup –,

But, not the ballad

            Of the ruins

                       In near forgotten Zvartnots*

... Or the malachite

            Precision unearthed

                       Within those Pushkin stanzas.

 

Here, at this moment

            Most copious, I glimpse

                      The peninsula of Sevan*

Where stonemasons

            Dug furiously

                       Their foundations... so that

A veritable lighthouse

            Could be born

                       To shed gentle power

About the lands

           Affectionately known

                       As ‘the mountain of suns...’

 

Who can forget, Armenia,

          Your Moscow accent?

                       Your frock-coat

Cut in Ottoman style?

          Your golden

                      Currency of cognac

Serving Japhetic philosophy*

         Born of

                      Noah’s second sight?

The Hebrew prayer hands...

         Monks’ tombs...

                     And grand sea serpents?

 

Meanwhile, the iron staircase

         Breathes a reticent

                   Mythological track

How gravity dropped

        Three apples*

                  In bold parenthesis

To three esperanto

        Citizens seeking

                  Harmony of civility.

The first parable told

        The tale; the second

                  Was for the one who listened;

 

And the third –, helix of the ear,

       It marked

                  The Hermit who understood.

Prototype provincialism, wry

       Ship of Peter,

                  Passes only nameless graves.

The bleeding thorn-bush

       Keeps vigil to commissars

                  Caught and set agape

So that I,

      Recorder-politico, cannot attempt

                  Redress except in this:

 

Dank gratis.

Dank gratis.

Dank gratis.

 

[* Arsacids – ancient rulers / Humanistic Order -

Arshak & Shapur [legendary kings] ref. is to

Stalin’s oppression /Colchis – other name for

Caucasus / Troika – Russian 3 man admin.

council / Zvartnots – locals lived by the sun

-dial amid the ruins where a rose is inscribed

in stone / Sevan – Armenian peninsula /

Japhetic – relates to all pre-Indo- Euro-

pean languages belonging to a group

named after Noah’s other son / Three

Apples – ancient Armenian fairy-tale.]

 

Published by ‘Press Gang’

 

 

 

SHOT-GUN ALLEY       

 

 

Once I was accused of bravery.

Many times of imbecility’s uprising.

Of wrong-doing. Of being

A down right down-and-out-meddler!

I wish... “they’d”

Make up their minds –.

Come on out from under

The coat-and-dagger business

Of passing the pistol

From one sweaty fist to another...

 

When will they learn how

Expendable we all are?

This is no fair-ground. There

Are no rotating plaster pigeons –,

Only those who accept them.

 

Understand when I say... all side-shows

And shot-gun alleys must be

                                   Shut down!

Your children nurse telescopic sights

And aim them at the age. It’s not

                              ‘Civil disobedience’

... All forms of fright need protection.

 

At the risk of accusation once again,

I will draw the bull’s-eye for you.

Notice how my hand shakes!

The circle’s hardly uniform.

The chalk shrieks like an air-raid siren.

 

In our ‘centre’ sits a void –, without

Principle... without regret.

That is our villain! He rules

                 The fair-ground of the head.

                 His identity

                 Is politically correct.

Unofficially, he’s quite mad.

Officially, he’s long dead.

 

Think logically –, now. Stop accusing me

Of bravery.

I’ve simply said

What it is

I’ve... said.

 

 

[Chap book, Maleny & District

Community co-op Publishers]

 

 

Stefanie Bennett has published several books of poetry, a novel, and a libretto. Her poems have appeared in The Galway Review, Record-Magazine, The Provo Canyon Review, Communion,
Boston Poetry Magazine, Shot Glass Journal, Carcinogenic Poetry, VerseWrights and others.
Of mixed ancestry [Italian/Irish/Paugussett-Shawnee], she was born in Townsville, Queens-
land, Australia in 1945