RUNNER

Sole runner on the sand-mirror

(reflecting, separating colors of the spectrum

more clearly than the sky) prances

through the foamy edge,

leaves small footprints soon erased 

remembered only by observers at the time

and (having none besides)

remaining secret kept by me,

the constant ocean and

the ever-changing sky

© Sandra Wade

   Sept. 8, 1991

FALL IN !

Body needs

to curl up in a cave or

migrate to warmer climes

but socialized mind says

"No! you have to rush

from Hallowe'en to New Year's

(shop, clean, cater, decorate,

be hospitable) - be convivial!"

So we may fall in line,

shape up, gird our loins

for the fray

force a smile

fake a laugh

until we grow old or

   smart

NUTS IN DECEMBER

Democracy now streams daily

from little Denmark's capital

My great-aunt raged against Hitler

in that land

but now Danish cops arrest any

who just might 

     cause unrest

Climate Justice convenes outside

The Bella Center ('bella' Latin for

           Wars)

I'm scalding my fresh-ground coffee

look up and see a cabinet 

door ajar -- and a can labelled

   'Imperial Nuts'

Figure in a hot pool

by curved ancient layered rock

like an amphitheatre

peopled only by small ferns

leaves of houndstooth

and a patch of creeping violet

Which one here is actor or proscenium

and which is audience?

There is exchange of solemn gaze

discerning wrinkles, grimaces and grins

hearing whispers of millennia

echoed in the lacy net of usnea

rustle of small leather leaves

on spindly parched live oak

One bows, the other sits

impassive as a wizened sage

(c) Sandra Wade

QUIET

In between the silences

of held breath

gravel crunches

step by contemplative step

Hand reaches to palpate

a firm green fig

as if it might have softened

since ten minutes have elapsed.

In this hiatus of the mind

time has flown and yet

stood still.

(C) Sandra Wade

At first each clump of hay-gold grass

every small branch of dried brown leaves

could be his body in the dusk

hunkered down or slain by passing car or cougar

Then you notice glossy buckey

tawny seed heads of St. John's Wort

curling bark of manzanita paler than bole

and therefore like his red-gold coat

Each ruddy hump of earth or tan volcanic rock

or fresh pine needle pile a passing magnet

to the anxious searcher's eyes

Orange gold of poison oak on roadsides

and dessicated buckeye leaves --

all autumn colors bear his name

until eyes ache and bulge with strain

to see again his liquid amber eyes

his coat of burnished gold

(c) Sandra Wade

 FRONTISPIECE

for Elmore Leonard’s “Ten Rules of Writing” *

A suede brown bomber jacket,

beige cloth cap, shades and cigarette are placed

to indicate the man who’s not inside

A busty green-bra’d siren’s hair streams up like seaweed,

tail ends in a yellow shape half-crumpled

like a sheet of notepad paper – she has arms and body

Right hand holds a long thin tube that passes

(through or past?) the man and past an alligator’s

gaping saw-toothed maw aiming for the man – but

maybe she’s inflating one or both

Above the creature’s crazy eye floats

a gendarme’s peaked cap without insignia

There’s a skinny palm tree, a revolver,

a string-handle shopping bag also gaping

showing wads of paper currency. On the horizon hangs

a city’s silhouette, sky-scrapered with a single flag

blowing on its roof-top mast

                                                            © Sandra Wade March 28, 2010

* Elmore Leonard’s Ten Rules of Writing, 2007,

Illustrated by Joe Ciardello

(originally appeared 7/16/2001 in New York Times as “Essay on the Adverbs, Exclamation Points and Especially Hooptedoodle”)

He pokes a small finger into his mother’s ribs, urging, “Get up now – morning light!”

She unlocks her eyes just in time to see the last smudge of sunrise.

She does not want to move or even to wake yet on their roadside bed of

dry late-summer grass by a patch of mesembryanthemum. A cypress hedge and a fence encrusted with weathered grey-green lichen shield them from the sea breeze on one side; her dusty little car on the other hides them from the country lane leading to the lighthouse.

She turns onto her belly, slides her journal from under the pillow and

begins to write:

     Lichen, cobweb, oaten grasses

trembling above my head in stirrings of morning air

are my close-up on life this day

before I confront the limitless majesty of ocean

and sunrise -- out there somewhere

where infinity lines might meet

Ocean murmur, liquid call of the meadowlark,

haunting monotone from the lighthouse beep –

country chamber music

Sunrise is arched over by the tunnel view from inside the sleeping bag. The cypress hedge and telephone poles bordering the road lead the gaze

far into the distance like lines in a well-composed painting. She sets the

slim book aside, rolls onto her back and takes a deep breath of cool air.

The ocean roars gently and sky turns clearest blue over their dew-dampened bed. Her disgruntlement dissolves as the toddler nuzzles at her breast. Another poem takes shape in her mind:

Sometimes it’s a race to see

who can wake first,

grab the reins and race away

with the other a reluctant

delighted captive

on the steed, the fiery stallion,

the cowboy rocking horse

of a new day

© Sandra Wade, 1978 and 2010