SONGS OF EXOTIC BIRDS

POEMSBy Merle Fischlowitz

AuthorHouse

Copyright © 2012 Merle Fischlowitz
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4685-8790-6

Contents

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.........................vFOREWORD.................................viiIN A GARDEN..............................1THE DUCKS ARE BACK.......................2COYOTES HOWL.............................3FALSE SPRING.............................4PLANTING.................................5PRUNING..................................6BURNING LEAVES...........................7CANS.....................................8A DASH OF WONDER.........................9MUSEUM...................................10MATE WITH LIONS..........................11THE MEADOW...............................12SELF-PORTRAITURE.........................13LIKE NEW.................................14PENELOPE'S LAMENT........................16SHELTER TALK I...........................18SHELTER TALK II..........................19ARCADIA..................................20THE MAGIC................................21ODORLESS.................................22FAMILY LIFE..............................23ISLAND GIRL..............................24ANTHROPOLOGY.............................25GARDEN OF SCENT..........................26GRANDPARENTS.............................28CAMELLIAS................................29CROSSINGS................................30ALCHEMY..................................31PILLS....................................32A TEACHER'S PSALMS.......................33THE MICROSCOPE SHOWS.....................34ABOUT THE AUTHOR.........................36ABOUT THE ARTIST.........................37

Chapter One

    IN A GARDEN


    I have walked the paths of a formal garden
    and have carefully observed
    how delphiniums and violets,
    not too gaudily arranged,
    present a pattern instructing to my mind.

    I have also seen
    how carefully, meticulously,
    these flowers form a screen
    to keep hidden from my view
    the brambles of the hedge.

    And oftentimes I dream
    while strolling in the garden
    that I am in a jungle of violent trees,
    whose greedy vines
    I cannot escape.
    And the air is sweetly laden
    with songs of exotic birds.

    Earthbound plants entice me,
    to seek with them their roots.
    A multitude of colors,
    vibrant shades of life,
    attract my gaze to the fruits
    that promise renewed birth
    to the richness of the jungle
    and the treasures of the Earth.

    In chaste paths of wakefulness
    I silently observe,
    heed carefully, meticulously,
    the wise instructing words.

    But still at times I dream
    (possibly improperly)
    of songs of exotic birds.

    1952


    THE DUCKS ARE BACK

    The ducks are back again,
    the same pair
    as last year I am sure.

    Above his teal collar he wears
    a formal tie, white so pure
    it surprises me as he drinks
    from the muddy golf course pond nearby.

    She, mottled brown with flecks of gray,
    follows calmly and demure
    but a few steps away,
    waddling in the new tall grass
    fast grown from fine Spring rain.

    They arch their necks and peck
    to seek nourishing grubs
    for their next flight.

    I do not hear the sound that startles,
    causing them to pirouette, alert,
    and lift, to soar above
    the suburban scene
    we share so near.

    Above manicured lawns,
    pools, homes, and streets they fly,
    toward a goal I can only dream.

    With a farewell quack, a dip of wing,
    they've said good-bye,
    to return again
    next Spring, I pray.

    1997


    COYOTES HOWL

    Each night I hear coyotes howl,
    distressed to smell another skunk
    killed on a nearby road.

    Each night coyotes howl
    after my neighbors are in bed
    but not asleep. They remind me
    the land where our houses sit
    is stolen, once their free domain
    shared with owls, snakes, and mountain lions.

    Each night coyotes howl
    as fewer snakes remain for prey.
    Opossums prowl our yards
    for open garbage cans to feed
    their close and hungry young.

    Each night coyotes howl,
    seeking their mates in the dark,
    while ancient blood roils and turns
    to recall and dream again
    that they may outnumber us,
    locked inside, while they freely roam.

    Each night coyotes howl
    while I dream through open doors.

    1999


    FALSE SPRING

    The woodland creek that should be choked by ice
    flows freely as a freshet in a flood.
    As I survey the dormant land, where mud
    gives my feet and me a wet surprise,
    fruit trees, budding out of time, and lilacs
    (recalling last year, or foretelling next?)
    are joined by robins, equally perplexed
    by warm reprise from Winter's cold attacks.

    Perhaps the times have changed. The seasons' pace
    quickens. Must we be eternally bound
    by Earth's incline to the Sun? Resound
    stars and planets! Give Earth another face!
    But now, still the early Winter sunset,
    and Spring must wait; our cat's not pregnant yet.

    1967


    PLANTING

    We took fifty Scotch pine trees,
    saplings eighteen inches high,
    from the car. My son, age five,
    and I covered them with burlap bags,
    watered to protect this hedge to be,
    to fence our yard from busy street.

    Each Spring afternoon we'd dig
    and plant and water just a few,
    until his patience and my arms
    tired, and we quit, for a day or two.

    For five years we watched
    the small trees grow, staking
    weak ones for Winter snow,
    pleased to see the straightened green
    emerge each Spring. My son also grew.

    Family split moved us all away,
    from home, street and trees.
    Sweet recollection of planting stays,
    decorates the bonds that grow
    through the years, as I see
    my son and his children
    make their own memories.

    I planted in those early years
    and enjoyed rich reward of family.
    Now I plant new ideas, new work,
    new friends. Like trees
    they bring my season
    promise of eternal Spring.

    1998


    PRUNING

    August heat on deep purple grapes,
    and the treasures of the earth
    yield up to the careful gardener,
    thankful for his duty's just reward.

    Amid the vines, promising rich
    wine and sweet jam,
    wanton weeds grow.

    A bramble-rose, thistles, and some sedge
    do not fit the gardener's plan
    of orderly vines, productive arbors.
    His pruning knife will soon cut
    the weeds, making way
    for next year's stronger grapes.

    Weeds must give way,
    to be missed only
    by the sucking bee,
    a hiding rabbit,
    and a humming bird in suspended flight.

    1967


    BURNING LEAVES

    We left the noisy Halloween party,
    too much masked laughter
    heating up the small basement room,
    where others enjoyed their childhood games.

    Carl and I sat on a dusty curb,
    trading imagined secrets
    about girls we didn't know.
    I found a matchbook lying there
    and played as if I could light
    a cigarette I never held.

    The flame dropped to the street
    on a pile of leaves, and smoke
    curled up between my feet.
    Staring at the yellow, baby flame,
    we waited too long to stamp it out
    with our new dress shoes.

    We ran back to the house,
    young hearts beating strong and fast,
    and pretended to have fun, until
    a siren screamed in our tranquil street.

    We joined the children, parents too,
    who dashed to see the fire engine
    rumbling in the street.

    No one knew we had lit the match
    that burned the leaves that singed
    Mr. Cohen's new red Dodge.

    Today I know that burning leaves
    are easier to quench than warm hearts
    when falsely lit.

    1997


    CANS

    He stepped in front of my car
    as I stopped at the light.
    Not two feet away from me
    he stooped to the street,
    then stood and showed me
    two soda cans he retrieved.

    In the balmy sunset air
    he wore a long-sleeved shirt,
    under a torn sweater
    showing beneath an army jacket.
    He was prepared for the cool air
    that comes at night to the sidewalks
    of our coastal town.

    He put the two cans in a sack
    as he stepped back
    off the street, giving me
    a courtly bow of thanks.

    After dinner and symphony
    I drove past rows of blankets
    and stopgap beds lined up
    in doorways of shops and offices.
    I wondered which of these
    makeshift sleeping bags
    covered the man who bowed
    to me as he added to his trove
    of treasured cans.

    1998


    A DASH OF WONDER

    New tests can pry open
    the infant brain, observe the synapses
    as they grow, record each new word,
    the links between that make for uttered sense.

    Echo of a mother's womb;
    the talk around a nursing baby;
    each sweet sound that parents speak
    and hum and sing; all imprint on brain's circuitry,
    teach rules of grammar and of speech.

    Science shows that each newborn
    hears no foreign tongue.
    All sounds are learned,
    mimicked in set ways,
    formed according to an inborn scheme
    hard-wired into an infant's brain.

    Yet before many years have passed
    that child rejects the sounds, the tones,
    and the one whose speech doesn't fit
    what's known from early days.

    Perhaps some day we can again open
    the growing brain, inspire curiosity
    for the unknown and new,
    pull out the fears and hate,
    and with the latest magic
    instill a dash of wonder.

    1998

Based on an article in "U. S. News & World Report," June 15, 1998. References are to The Language Instinct, by Steven Pinker, and work of Noam Chomsky.

    MUSEUM


    She sat on the floor, in front
    of the disjointed, multi-hued guitar,
    colored pencils in hand,
    copying Picasso's famous work.

    Black boots in style to suit
    the women stalking round
    the room; casual loafers worn
    by professors or accountants,
    retired, or taking one day off;
    walked around the young girl,
    lost in the art of making art.

    Two small lips are set, as her brown eyes
    move carefully from the painting
    to her paper on the floor.
    She has olive skin, a youthful glow
    brightening her face. Her dark hair falls
    over one eye, much as the woman with Picasso
    in the photo in the nearby room.

    Add ten years and she could be
    a model, a conquest, a partner,
    to this satyr, the Minotaur,
    whose work she copies while sitting
    on the museum floor.

    Several hundred paintings line the walls
    but the most classic face of all
    is on the girl studying the guitar.

    1999


    MATE WITH LIONS

    "Lions mate with lions,
    not with mice," said Gilot,
    widow of Salk,
    lover of Picasso.

    In life's jungle we all choose,
    as did Paris stealing Helen
    and letting loose the thousand ships;

    as did Browning wooing
    Elizabeth at Barrett's home;

    as did Sand and Chopin,
    Bergman and Rosselini.

    As others,
    neither lions nor mice,
    seek union with one,
    disparate yet alike,
    to stride together
    among the beasts.

    1998

From a San Diego Union-Tribune interview with Francoise Gilot, 1998

    THE MEADOW

    Somewhere a meadow waits,
    trees spread round frame the scene
    where flowers always bloom,
    replaced each day, each week
    by a clock unseen.

    Fresh clean smell of grass and air
    is sweetened by a figure,
    there on the hill, beyond the barn
    where horses once slept
    and rusting tools now are kept.

    Resting on the hill,
    she then stands, alone,
    gazing to the downward side
    past today.

    She thinks to leave the daily cares
    of life, fast, frenetic and unformed.
    The next meadow draws her gaze
    as she reflects, surveys her future,
    hid in cloudy swirls:

    Go back to town, and its daily tedium,
    not knowing when to return
    to meadow's open air? Or walk on,
    transformed,
    over a hill to the next meadow,
    to a new world, as yet unseen?

    1997

After "Christina's World" by Andrew Wyeth.

    SELF-PORTRAITURE

    Does the mirror ever lie?
    Can the artist, when he's painting
    his own image,
    faithfully rely on reflection cast back to him
    from silvered glass?
    Or will an inner eye
    dictate the lines, planes, angles, and shades
    that will come to pass for his outer self?

    When putting brush to easel, paint to canvas,
    can the painter ever know the ultimate result;
    whether what does show,
    to be seen by others,
    is truly his own face?

    Or will some inner vision
    stealthily replace the mirrored view
    with a perception more true,
    beyond his hand's revision?

    We are all artists in the making,
    giving selves renewed birth,
    only occasionally forsaking
    the Original Creator
    from whose palette
    we've sprung forth.

    1996


    LIKE NEW

    I remember the guys said "Hubba hubba"
    and whistled as I walked from school.
    I couldn't spend much on clothes,
    but what I had I used
    so the boys would do a double take.
    They liked the way I looked, the strut
    I showed as I worked
    as a clerk till nine each night.

    I never took much time for school.
    I had a high sense to rush
    into a grown-up world.
    The boss offered me
    such a deal
    I could not refuse to work
    more closely with him.
    We had a grand affair,
    his wife never knew,
    until my waist had outgrown
    my simple clothes.

    I innocently went to her for help.
    She gave me her things
    that were next to new:
    skirts, large tops,
    and her husband too.

    I knew I was too young
    to be a good mother,
    support a baby and me too.
    So I let the baby be adopted.
    "Finders keepers," I thought
    of the loving lucky pair
    who gave him a home.

    Now I'm married once again.
    I never found a man brand new,
    but this one is Opus Two
    for this gilded lady. I still like
    clothes that sparkle plenty
    but the glow I love the best
    is in my husband's eyes.

    1999

(Continues...)

Excerpted from SONGS OF EXOTIC BIRDSby Merle Fischlowitz Copyright © 2012 by Merle Fischlowitz. Excerpted by permission of AuthorHouse. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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