Scattered Thickets

Found poetry takes words out of context and rearranges them into a new story. From a description of Eastern Black Nightshade here is a found poem marking headaches of big cities everywhere.

Scattered Thickets   

         from Wild Berries & Fruit

        by Teresa Marine, 2018

Urban summers, hard and green,

grow in waste grounds and vacant lots.

Climbing, vining, cutleaf. Problems

ripen and cluster. It becomes tricky

to judge rocky ground.

Foragers avoid nightshade areas

and starred people entirely.

According to the database,

they are a separate species.

Marilyn Aschoff Mellor

         

September 2020

 September 2020

Up north exists a panorama dipped

in the gold of coins, the orange

of sunsets, and the crimson

of royalty. Shafts of sunshine

burnish the maples and oaks,

accent the aspens. But these

vibrant stands remain powerless

before the receding light.

Bequeath, instead, memories

of change and charm to help us

navigate the dark days ahead.

So, too, with Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Marilyn Aschoff Mellor

Graveyards of the Mind

Fifteen years ago this month my brother died. He left a void that time has not filled. And, obviously, I still miss him. 

Graveyards of the Mind

A cemetery lost among corporate

cornfields on prime Dakota land.

A solitary square of prairie grass

swaying above souls below.

A muddy trek on Memorial Day

for a kid prompted to place flowers

on tombs of kin. More like a chore.

                      *

My brother called it right

when he died: cremation. But

his wife hauls him with her

          unable to settle

his ashes, stashes him in a closet.

No matter. Departed family members

finally free as the wind:

my mother, a mistral, annoyed

with my dismissal of burial sites

my father, ever a zephyr promising,

           "All will be well"

and my sib, a laughing gust today,

messing with my boat on Green Lake Bay.

Marilyn Aschoff Mellor

Fool

I listen to a short, daily podcast sponsored by NPR called "Make Me Smart" hosted by Kai Ryssdal and Molly Wood. Once a week the listeners are invited to send in something he or she thought they knew but later found out they had it wrong all along. The following would only be the beginning of a list I have revised for years.

Fool

Yesterday at the feeder

a newcomer: a finch

more magenta than mauve,

confused by me for a female cardinal.

On my kitchen counter:

a pristine pitcher

in the form of an orange,

a find in a second-hand store,

but not the mid-century vintage

I thought when I bought it.

In Congress: legislation

promising to outlaw lynching,

a presumption of progress by me.

But no, this same bill proposed

over a century ago.

A north country mandate:

the removal of ice-fishing houses

'from frozen waterways by March

the 1st. Misconstrued in my view

as an end of all things winter.

And within my soul

the songs of you: our nights

of star drift and rooms of heat,

these, too, mistaken by me - this time

                                  for signs of love.

Marilyn Aschoff Mellor  

Wiped Clean

I clearly remember applying for TSA Pre-Check, and the problem my faded fingerprints posed. The frustrated agent finally sent in the partial prints she had painstakingly obtained. Apparently, that was sufficient.

Wiped Clean

"Wash your hands!" tagged me

like words stitched to my shadow:

admonishments from my mother

postings in public restrooms

moralizing in med school

and now caveats about Coronavirus.

So I lathered and rinsed, soaped

and soaked. And my fingerprints slowly

sloughed off. Of dubious import to me

but not so for the Feds. A problem

for Pre-Check. A glitch in their game

plan.

After a delay, my partial prints okayed. But

in this conscious raising time white-bread me

wonders if I had darker skin would I be

at the back of the line again?

Marilyn Aschoff Mellor