Stefanie Bennett- Two Poems

Stefanie Bennett has published several poetry books, a libretto & a novel & has poems appearing in The Fib Journal, The Kalyna Review, Illya’s Honey Journal, Message in a Bottle, Shot Glass Journal, The Provo Canyon Review, Ink, Sweat & Tears, Mad Swirl, Galway Review, The Camel Saloon & others. Of mixed ancestry [Irish/Italian/Paugussett-Shawnee] she was born in Qld., Australia – & her latest poetry title “The Vanishing” [2015] was published by Walleah Press ... available at Walleah, Amazon & Fishpond Books.

 

 

 

CINNAMON WAY for Judith Wright   

 

Gravity’s split... and gales across

The channel

Rearrange old harmonies.

Even this pocket-watch

That purred its tryst

Through a Depression’s lean-ness

Has given up

The ceremonial ticking.

 

There’s less precision in circumference

These days.

About facing

The bathroom mirror,

A known stranger

Waves an impressionist salute.

I ponder. What remains

Of Billich’s world?* Slessor’s monarchy?*

 

I say – ‘Poet... ideals and sensibilities

Are posthumous

To any cause.’

The still-living ‘I’ accords

A lateral steam-shape

That’s form without grace. Now,

Probability’s lit by

Brush strokes axed and faded.

 

Entowelled, I wander back to what’s left

Of the library’s warmth.

“... So the ghost cried

And pressed

To the dark pane!” +

I say – ‘Dusk, my blue-chip librettists, is

Diviner dust. It finds us

                Placidly profound

In order to negotiate.’

 

On cue, lightning forks the vestibule

And the near-by

Isle, Mudjimba. No

Post modernism here... just

A subverted femme fatale

Wringing out the spheres – and

A stopped watch

Polishing its own numerals.

 

 

[*Billich, artist. *+Slessor “So the ghost etc”, poet.

Mudjimba Isle, South-East Queensland].

 

 

 

LIFE STILLS       

 

Mistaking this love

Would mean

That the air has

No rhythm

 

To beat its wings

Upon...