Venus on the Half Year, poem by Mary-Marcia Casoly (Half New Year Poetry Series)

VENUS ON THE HALF YEAR
(For Mary)

by Mary-Marcia Casoly

She is surpassingly lovely throughout the whole of July,
emerging from the sea. Her northern declination
rapidly decreases

in direct proportion to our increased inclinations.
Divine love twists the torso
but does not prevent Venus from being

the most attractive bewitching grace
in our starlit sky, surfing
her way through our fallibility.

Infinite are summer nights.
Her appointed calendar so full to about
3 o’clock on the half-shell,

Improbably balanced, point ahead naked
or with the naked eye an opera starlet
that dares not collapse. Her transparent skin

so like the moon at last quarter.
Her linear passion takes place 1˚14’
north of the erudite. Sir Regulus takes the handle

of the sickle. Sir Leonis takes her spoon.
Witness this celestial meeting to know
what passes between them.

Nothing less than our failings converge
as tasks and loves yet to be. No reluctance
to become as we once were. Endless summer has

no perspective. Our dreams contrapposto,
at the very same time our principal actors dis-
appear from the scene; and we slip

beneath her horizon. An interesting phenomenon.
The bright moonlight may dim Regulus’s luster,
to no effect on Venus.

The ball keeps moving. Venus on the move and growing
more brilliant night after night in conjunctivitis
cahoots with Gamma Leonis,

following closely convivial conjecture with Rho Leonis.
It may be helpful to have some little knowledge
of opera, when our fairest star reaches

her greatest elongation. She’ll stick her neck out
for us, 45 ˚33’ – no contest.
Venus’s lessons will lengthen

our stay against destiny, drawing from
Kilgore Trout; being one with St. Bridget of Kildare,
thus proving her course changes as butter churns.

Twisting her torso left, she flips her head upside-down,
waterfalls of hair ripple above Rollingstone.
Figures cast no shadows

On the 31^st of July she will sit little more than
an hour and a half after the sun. Venus’s right
ascension was the 2^nd of July: 9 hrs 50 min long.

She cannot be defined by GPS. The bodies and poses
of the wind, even harder to figure out.
Her eyes are the color of the sea.

Rose petals skim air. She is surpassingly lovely.
Waves ease back and forth, challenge conventional
memory. The constellation of Leo rises.

IMAGE: “The Birth of Violet Venus,” based on “The Birth of Venus” by Sandro Botticelli (1486). Prints available at fineartamerica.com.

AUTHOR’S NOTE: I found an old newspaper astronomy column dated July 1887. The quaint phrasings brought to mind some midnight social intrigue, and then Botticelli’s Venus arrived on the scene. While writing “Venus on the Half Year” I was told my birth mother had recently died. I was struck how beautiful she looked in her obituary photo. The poem became a kind of elegy, in which I send her onward to mythic rebirth.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Mary-Marcia Casoly is the author of Run to Tenderness (Pantograph&Goldfish Press 2002) and the editor of Fresh Hot Bread, a local zine for Waverley Writers, an open poetry forum based in the San Francisco Bay area. Her chapbook Lost Pages of Bird Lore was published by Small Change Series, WordTemple Press (2011) Her chapbook “Austrailia Dreaming” is included in the The Ahadada Reader 3, published by Ahadada Press (2010) Her poem “Song of Mayhem” appears in the Silver Birch Press May Poetry Anthology (2014).

In Praise of Dogs Who Howl at the Moon, poem by John Brantingham

IN PRAISE OF DOGS WHO HOWL AT THE MOON
by John Brantingham

Some nights,
everything on Earth is loose,
and you feel yourself slipping off gravity’s
mooring, slipping off into
the night, feel the moon’s going to grab
you and pull you out into space
and slingshot you past Mars and Jupiter
out to where Pluto
and all the rest of the solar system’s losers live,
out where you will never see
you wife laugh the way she
laughs when you do your impression of her father,
laugh the way a person can laugh only
when it’s funny but she’s ashamed too,
laugh with the wild joy of a bear
waking up after months of sleep—
on those nights you want to grab onto something
wedged deep and tight as a burr in a furry ear
and scream your complaints at the moon
as the dogs howl
and the bears roar and everyone shouts
together—you want to yell that no one
belongs out there in the cold with Pluto
that we belong here where summer love is
and anyone who loves and howls
is one of Earth’s favorite children.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:  John Brantingham’s poetry and fiction have been published in hundreds of magazines and venues, including Garrison Keillor’s Writer’s Almanac, Pearl, Tears in the Fence, Confrontation, and The Journal. His books include East of Los Angelesand Let Us All Pray to Our Own Strange Gods (forthcoming from World Parade Books). He works at Mt. San Antonio College, where he teaches English and directs the creative writing programs.

“In Praise of Dogs Who Howl at the Moon” and other poetry by John Brantingham appears in the Silver Birch Press Summer Anthology(June 2013), available at Amazon.com.

Illustration: “Luna and the Moon Wolf,” watercolor by Gretchen Del Rio. Prints available at etsy.com.

Afterwards I Stayed Out for an Hour…Poem by John Brantingham

AFTERWARDS I STAYED OUT FOR AN HOUR BEFORE THEY MADE ME COME IN
by John Brantingham

I must have been eleven,
(or maybe I was twelve)
the first time I noticed a satellite.

It was the first really warm day of summer
in 1982 (or maybe it was 1983)
when the wind coming off the desert
had blown the smog out of L.A.
and the street lights
seemed to glare less than
usual, and that satellite crossed Orion,
the one constellation I knew, until it
got lost behind the orange
tree in my parent’s backyard.

By the time I’d climbed on
top of the garage to see it
again, it had vanished, and I
stood staring at each star individually—
squinting at each one, comparing
all of them to the stars nearby
making sure they stayed still—to see
if they too would lose their
grip on the night
and fall away into the sky.

PHOTO: “Orion Nebula Crossed by a Satellite” (celestronimages.com)

In Praise of Dogs Who Howl at the Moon, poem by John Brantingham

IN PRAISE OF DOGS WHO HOWL AT THE MOON
by John Brantingham

Some nights,
everything on Earth is loose,
and you feel yourself slipping off gravity’s
mooring, slipping off into
the night, feel the moon’s going to grab
you and pull you out into space
and slingshot you past Mars and Jupiter
out to where Pluto
and all the rest of the solar system’s losers live,
out where you will never see
you wife laugh the way she
laughs when you do your impression of her father,
laugh the way a person can laugh only
when it’s funny but she’s ashamed too,
laugh with the wild joy of a bear
waking up after months of sleep—
on those nights you want to grab onto something
wedged deep and tight as a burr in a furry ear
and scream your complaints at the moon
as the dogs howl
and the bears roar and everyone shouts
together—you want to yell that no one
belongs out there in the cold with Pluto
that we belong here where summer love is
and anyone who loves and howls
is one of Earth’s favorite children.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:  John Brantingham’s poetry and fiction have been published in hundreds of magazines and venues, including Garrison Keillor’s Writer’s Almanac, Pearl, Tears in the Fence, Confrontation, and The Journal. His books include East of Los Angeles and Let Us All Pray to Our Own Strange Gods (forthcoming from World Parade Books). He works at Mt. San Antonio College, where he teaches English and directs the creative writing programs.

“In Praise of Dogs Who Howl at the Moon” and other poetry by John Brantingham appears in the Silver Birch Press Summer Anthology (June 2013), available at Amazon.com.

Illustration: “Luna and the Moon Wolf,” watercolor by Gretchen Del Rio. Prints available at etsy.com.