Tag: sarah russell

Confession

Sarah Russell6 Comments

Just learned that my poem “Confession” (a vintage poem from 2018) was republished in Jama’s Alphabet Soup. My thanks to Jama and to Jayne Ferrer of Your Daily Poem for telling me. You just never know when something wonderful like this is going to happen, especially on a dreary March morning. Here’s the poem:

CONFESSION 


There’s a spider in the bathtub.
I saw him last night, and he’s still there
this morning, though I gave him fair warning
when I brushed my teeth before bed.
I need to take a shower.
But there’s a SPIDER.
In the BATHTUB.
My Dr. Schweitzer is arguing with my Eek.
He’s small –
smaller than a shirt button –
and round and 8 legs look like 3 too many.
But he’s in the BATHTUB.
Where I SHOWER.
NAKED.
I turn on the water, and he wiggles
a couple of legs but the spray doesn’t hit him,
so I don’t get a pass from Karma.
Then my Eek takes over,
and I get a piece of toilet paper,
and he wiggles 2 legs again but doesn’t run
so my Eek doesn’t get to plead self-defense.
I try to make it painless –
a squish and done – but then I wonder
if he was just trying to say hello,
and the shower’s kind of lonely
without him in there waving at me.

Bird Woman

Sarah Russell3 Comments

A second poem published in Red Eft Review.

Bird Woman

Nearing the shore at twilight,
she drifts in the wind’s current.
The lagoon below is still
as held breath.
Her eyes skirt the trees,
the marshy undergrowth
for a safe settling.
She tires easily now,
seeks sheltered landings
on timeworn wings,
her flight nearing
an unfamiliar shore
that beckons
with no promises.

End of Autumn

Sarah Russell1 Comment

The third poem published this week by Lothlorien Poetry Journal.

End of Autumn 
 
The small purple asters,  
still blooming,  
bow their heads to late October winds. 
I sit against the old oak. Its leather leaves  
crackle, gossiping about the coming snow.  
Passersby are zipping jackets, pulling hoodies  
tight to cover ears. Though robins have headed  
south, nuthatches and chickadees linger at the feeder,  
even when yearling squirrels shimmy up to fill  
their cheeks and race off toward the pine. Shadows  
are long by four. I’m glad for stew simmering 
in the crockpot and logs stacked for a fire this evening.  
I rise and find a new ache in my bones. The walk home  
feels lonely. My younger days have faded like summer  
warmth, and the ancient north wind beckons.

Change of Seasons

Sarah Russell5 Comments

The second of my poems published by Lothlorien Poetry Journal.

Change of Seasons

Summer turns sullen in August,  
stubborn with laggard heat,  

even as the maples start to blush 
and geese grow restless, taking great,  

noisy practice turns from pond to field.  
Castanets of crickets fill the night,  

and fireflies blink farewell. I gather  
the zealous bounty of zucchini  

and tomatoes, find caterpillars  
living large on my prized basil.  

Come evening, after the stagnant  
midday, I feel the first cool breeze  

of autumn. I breathe it in like a traveller  
at the gate, asking for a drink from the well. 

Hair

Sarah Russell9 Comments

A second poem published today by Writing in a Woman’s Voice.

Hair

1
It’s a woman’s crowning glory, Mother said, 
and she brushed my hair a hundred strokes 
at night, rolled it in rags so my long curls 
would bounce below the barrettes, wound them 
around her finger each morning. She pulled 
so hard my eyes watered. I hacked each curl 
off with kitchen shears when I turned twelve.

2
“Don’t ever cut it,” he said, and his hands 
were tender beside my face, then drifted
through, beyond. Mother’s mantra 
became my own. I brushed until it gleamed. 
Once he washed it for me like men do 
in Hallmark films. His fingers tangled, 
but I didn’t cry since women never cry 
in scenes like that.

3
The doctor said it would fall out, but the clumps 
in the shower drain startled me. I went to a salon
and told the girl to cut it off, right down 
to the scalp. She cried and I cried and she wouldn’t 
let me pay.

Celebrating Now

Sarah Russell8 Comments

The first of 3 poems published today in the wonderful Voice-Virtual. My thanks to editor Jim Lewis.

Long walks and sunshine. Not the mileage
I used to clock nor the speed, but birdsong
and daffodils I’d have missed before.
An outing with granddaughters, peeking
into their lives and loves, their favorite band
(loud) and the in spot for burgers and fries.
The quiet, driving home.
Dinner with friends, repeating tales decades old,
tsking at AI, cryptocurrency, Tik Tok, X.
Evenings of old sweatshirts and slippers
takeout and TV, my dog chasing rabbits
in his sleep.

Harbor Woman

Sarah Russell8 Comments

The third poem published in the wonderful Rusty Truck this week.

Harbor Woman

She takes them in — the peddler,
minstrel, gypsy. Townsfolk speak
in wanton whispers, how she beds
each one. They rebuke their budding
daughters who mime her loose-hipped
stroll. Addled by her lustered hair, full lips,
boys are whipped for where their hands go
in the night. But the same wives who beat
their sons, go in darkness for her herbs
so they will bleed again. Men, lured by musk
and breasts that push beneath her shawl,
dream her while astride those dowdy wives,
conjure her cries in their grinding. Beside
her hearth, sojourners tell of war and greed
and mutiny, of realms where she could dance
for kings, wear silks, call maids to brush her hair.
They tempt her to break free, but she knows
her place is here, knows she is the wellspring
of sweet water for parched village tongues.

Havana

Sarah Russell9 Comments

Here is the second poem published by Rusty Truck.

Havana

Early morning on the wharf, sharing a thermos
with Juan Pablo. He’s brown and scuffed
as old boots, tough like that too, eyes squinted
with age and sun. He knows the ocean
like his woman’s face, reads stars, wind,
waves, like poems. He’s mending a net, hands
stiff and scarred, sorting gnarls and frays,
ash falling from a Camel held square
between his teeth. A tourist interrupts,
though no one’s talking, wants to hire
the boat to fish tarpon. Juan Pablo grunts
and nods toward a salt-soaked sign
with hourly rates. The guy says he’ll be back
with his wife and kid. Juan Pablo watches him
stride toward a hotel, New York cadence
out of step with the lap of water on pilings.
He snorts, then gathers up the net, half done,
stands with a stumble to favor his bum knee.
He jerks his head toward the seamless join
of sea and sky. C’mon, he says, taking the stub
of Camel and grinding it under his heel.
That cabrón can hire another boat.

Thinking About Faith

Sarah Russell12 Comments

My poem is up at the wonderful Poetry Breakfast this morning. My thanks to editor Kay Kestner.

Thinking about Faith

I’m not talking religion here, 
although it’s nice to have that too. 
I’m thinking of the sun-rising-every-day 

kind of faith we take for granted—
that cars coming at me will stay 
in their lanes, that planes 

will land. It’s deeper than expectation—
that the dinner party will go well, 
or the Amazon delivery will arrive 

on Tuesday. It’s more akin 
to assurance—that when my friend 
says she understands, she does. 

Faith is more solid than Emily’s hope, 
more bedrock, but it’s beautiful 
like her feathery allusion—

that you’ll come home every evening,
that we will share our day, 
that you will hold my hand.

Autumn

Sarah Russell12 Comments

My thanks again to Corey Cook, who took 3 of my poems to publish in Red Eft Review. Here’s the second one.

Autumn

Sugar maples are the first to turn,
mottled orange and scarlet with the green,
trying on the season. I need a sweater
now for morning walks.

The geese abandon summer ponds
in keening, migrant skeins to follow
shorelines south.

In twilight, remnant fireflies
glint urgent calls to mate, hopeful,
as we are, for one last tryst
before winter.