Poet Vincent Calone has been busy this fall and early winter. To view a video of a recent poetry reading with Voicing Art, check out this on Vimeo:
Here is a Calone poem for your enjoyment.
THE BEADED PLUME
(ON THE FRUITED PLAIN)
Does it matter how we got here? No.
Beyond the precipice, now extinct.
The nuclear clock comes to a stop.
No amount of turquoise or silver
can turn back time, can undo the wrongs
of generations of malfeasance.
The white of your eyes matches the powder
white plumage of your father's headdress.
The same color as the ash and bone.
The iron rich blood, red and dark brown,
rotting in the sun, in the wasteland.
Does it matter how we got here? Pause.
The yellow of your belly- it shows.
Built upon the backs of the workers,
you rule alone from the throne. What good
is winning when the world is ruined?
When there is no more green grass of home?
When you get sold down the river? None!
When there no longer is a river.
When there no longer is a mountain.
When we can no longer hear the birds.
When the world as we know it ceases.
Stops. When everything turns to ash gray.
When even the prettiest beads fail
to persuade you to give up the ghost.
Blood is thicker than water my friend,
without it, we would not have survived.
v.j.calone
form - syllabics/ ekphrastic
(9 syllables per line/free verse/9 stanza/ 3 lines per stanza)
(special thank you to T.A.Niles and M.T. Pariti for the edit)