
				MARY FRANCES POETRY
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POETRY

Mary Frances Coffey

Daubs and Splotches

Wistfulness

My old dream reappears.

Like bolero, our dance whirls about.

For a night, Rumi’s songs resound.

Satiated, we clasp hands, hold on until dawn.

Impelled by new eyes, the new voice

and fervoured, I wish to make a permanence felt.

My verse ensues.

Defensive Measures

Nowadays, I make a cocoon of my chair

a womb of warmest down for sleeping

for safety and comfort, sitting upright

breathing deeply, emptying my mind of faltering

as I face what’s to come… oblivion.

Exercise class, tomorrow, once more.

Count the Rings

Its bones are mottled where they show

branches bent and gnarled,

easily cracked,

budding later each year.

My sycamore is become skeletal

over our years,

together.

This year,

the plumber hasn’t needed

to bore through its roots

A storm may knock it down

any day,

this tornado time in spring

I I remember touching a face

To me the epitome of grace

Even without those lips

From which endearments slipped

In such an unpracticed way.

That hair had a mildness of waves

As the sea is, in tranquil times

And the soft sheen of fur’s gleam,

When brushed by loving hands

Awkward in their grace.

Those eyes were of a blue

To quite turn my heart enough

So when I kissed their ivory lids,

I knew the anguish that

being forbids that two can be as one.

We Stayed Too Long

I lie here with you

Like two beached whales

Scrabbling upon the shingle

For that munificent sea of sleeping.

Seeking for comfort in dry dreams

Of that ocean of safety and warmth

We both knew once,

I hear your sigh between my sobs

And share your sadness

So cold and private.

Old Bull Buffalo

They are fierce, still,

Suffering, as always,

Hanging around the herd,

Until driven out to wander,

Blindly and stumbling,

Into the circle of wolves.

Their sons and daughters never knew them.

Adamancy

A marmot’s whistle

warns. Dive or die.

Coyote, fox prowl.

Now, quiet quickens.

Then, hungry Man, observer

stepped from the chasm

to shatter stillness.

Such chaos he has fissured into

Visages earth and sky.

Analogy

Feeling like an aged bear

crippling from her cave

bright light blinding rheumy eyes

after restless sleep, hungry, irritable

peering around for cubs not there.

Hadn’t been in years, tugging

mewing, nested in her fur.

She wandered over the hill

down toward that valley

folded into a heap, muttered

fell asleep, warmed by the sun.

A Touch of Brown Sugar

I eat crunchy cereal

with coffee and cognac

wait to see

which dream surfaces.

Will it be that you save me

or again, I protect them from theirs,

tigers, bears or sharks

on the awful shores of sleeping, alone.

Whirligig

That conundrum, mind and body

sidles downward trundling wishes

whap, whapping

over terrain turned unfamiliar

in its proximity to untouched splendor

shaking bedrock, shattering the reality

of hum-drum living.

Let the landing be right side up.

Revising Melville

Ahab wept in the dying whale's jaws

As the sea swallowed up its founderlings;

And the matchstick masts and the harpoon straws

Have long ago bleached on pristine beaches.

Thirties Harvest

I climbed atop the corn bin.

I dived into the sun.

I swam in its shifting rays.

I buried myself as one,

Who does not hear the reaper

Beneath the musty sun.

My father came to find me,

To draw me from the sun,

To pull and take and bind me

To lifetime husking corn.

I cannot fault my father.

He was his father's spawn,

Charged with keeping children

From foundering in the sun.

Maybe Tomorrow

Horned head bowed, stubby legs widened,

Her calf nestles under her.

Massive bulls rage up.

Slinking off, hungry wolves follow

As the herd grazes

Prairie dogs pop back up.

As the snow whitens dust,

The sun sets on hungry pups.

Gulfs

I shot at my father, last night.

He was shooting at me.

My son hooked a lion

Fished out a woman

With a long red mane.

I awoke amazed, clothed myself

Walked out into sunshine

Smiled at the mockingbird

Greeted my next door neighbor

Who nodded absently.

Vintage ' 30

Solitude is vital to me.

While I mull to sweeten biting memories

Make notes for suitable images

I hug myself for lack and luck.

White hot anger has kinked body and brain.

Aging tempers it.

It is bottled now, not vinegary.

Still, I spice my daily sustenance.

Dessert for Gulls And Crows

Shabby, old cobbled flues smoke.

Quickened steps, hungering eyes

tiredness at end, soon.

Greaseless, a wheel groans, screeches

the rim warps, spokes snap

loosened nails, screws, joins pry open

the hub nut rolls off, is lost.

Earlier, a bent axle unnoticed.

Clusters of scuppernong cling

to a scattered cart.

Within call, the house.

Voluptuary

Masked by middle age,

Pincushiony from desires,

My thought train is pellucid.

I take epicurean delight

In saffron yellow rice

And small pink shrimp,

The romance of appetite.

Daubs and Splotches

Were drink an antidote, I would embrace it.

Having tried many palliatives

this is my A.M. meditation.

After coffee and toast

I greet our lone rosebush

with its single faded pink bloom

then the lush bamboo shoots

gracing my sunny kitchen window.

A. M. Mind

Give me surcease from stoicism.

Let me be hopeful.

Pillow my helpless years to come

with a more generous laughter

less tinged with the critics' view

of the foibles of our kindred.

I would be a sensitive child, once more.