California State University (CSU): Open Journal Systems

Allen, Alice

Alice Allen 
October 
For William Carlos Williams 
Half awake at dawn 
I thought that golden poplar 
was the sun itself 
streaming in my window 
so bright against 
the shadowed mountains 
and all day that 
flame-shaped tree 
has flickered in my mind 
demanding celebration. 
I want that poplar 
and that particular light 
to linger in my poem 
the way a red wheel barrow 
stays in yours: 
forever fixed and colorfast. 
October's such a fragile month­
next week it will be gone. 


English

October: For William Carlos Williams

Fogg, Daniel

Two Poems: Untitled and "for wanda c."

Romero, Caesar

Two Poems: "Red Head Mind" and "The Only Fact"

Coleman, Bobbie R.

Bobbie R. Coleman 
Dancing With Grampa Jake 
He smiles, tells me 
I'm a smart little girl 
will make someone a good wife. 
My parents say, respect your elders 
call him Grampa Jake; dance with him . 
The band plays Glen Miller 
who died before I was born; 
he tells me, this 
is how grown-ups dance 
not like the trash 
your friends listen to. 
His hand rubs slowly up my spine, 
each vertebra the note 
of a chromatic scale 
creeps silently up my sweater, 
finds the strap 
to my training bra 
shoots electric current up my backbone 
forms a maelstrom in my gut. 
He chuckles and fidgets, 
the clasp tight 
as my clenched jaw. 
My parents beam 
at their big girl, poised 
and grown at ten. 
Shallow breath passes my ear 
sweat beads his forehead, 
I grimace, wait for the band 
to end the Moonlight Serenade. 


Dancing With Grampa Jake

Weiner, Susan

Susan Weiner 
I Dreamed Mr. Eliot Was A Maid 
Here is a mop and paH and a cake of soap, 
Clean, clean, the house is unclean, 
I will take my sponge and grope 
Behind the appliances for dirt; 
Here are hands that bleed and are raw, 
Clean, clean, the house is unclean. 
If you knew what I have seen 
You too might throw down other work: 
Crumbs and lime, rot, and grime, 
Harbor where company never looks, 
Quietly breed the brackish slime 
And things that scurry in the dark. 
I am privy to untold matter 
That gathers in the crcviced gloom, 
I have leamed to ignore a tidy room 
And check under the bed. 
Because these eyes have looked too close, 
Clean, clean, this house is unclean, 
I struggle with my heart to lose 
Knowledge of that darker space; 
22 NORTHRIDGE REVJHW 
Hence I sink. back in disgust, 
Clean, clean, this house is unclean 
And grow unquiet when I deem 
Even a chair has slipped its place. 


I Dreamed Mr. Eliot Was A Maid

Pape, Ronald

RonaldPape 
Places the Desert Takes You When It Takes You 
Early Summer, New Mexico 
Acoma woman 
Sky city woman 
Bone woman 
Yellow mesa woman 
Dust woman 
Mud woman 
Earthy eyed obsidian adobe woman 
I see her sit and shuck blue com 
Under the sun that has always been in this place 
And will always be in this place 
Burly armed pig iron grampa 
Chicago German asks 
-How can such a lovely girl 
Throw away her life in this place?-
Acoma woman squats 
Over a blue stone 
Pisses gold 
I taste the sun 
Mid Summer, Nevada 
The ghost dance begins again in the Nevada desert 
Where Wovoka used to whirl and chant and whisper 
To the homed toads and tumbleweeds 
Now fat Kansas farmers from the Vegas slots 
Sweat pooling in the ridge between belly and boobs 
Shuffle and shout in the white dust 
Ohio shopkeepers toss of stiff denim shirts 
Sink raw and jutting knees 
Between creosote circles 
They Dance the One Dance One Dance One Dance Dance 
White dust rises up 
Into the burnt eyes of the sky 
Santa Ana oven air presents the dust 
To the soft pink throats of Angelinos 
As they drift 
Air conditioned 
On melting black asphalt 
Late Summer, Archeology of the Mojave River Basin 
This is the place 
Where washes meet 
The place of cottonwoods 
The jasper place 
The black schist place 
The place of chalcedony 
And hard white clay 
We dig here by centimeters 
With garden trowels and paint brushes 
Bending our backs to the full sun 
21 
22 NORTHRIDGE REVIEW 
Pores open to the greasy dirt 
Our faces black with garbage soil 
This is midden 
The toilet sand 
Once while picking at caliche 
I glanced into the now dried wash 
To see a purple black raven 
Picking between the dull ribs 
Of a long dead dog 
What we find: 
Charcoal, juniper seeds, 
Piles and piles of rock chips, 
Rat bones, deer bones, bear bones, 
But never yet a human bone 


Places the Desert Takes You When It Takes You

Sigman, Barbara

Two Poems: "Waiting for Ryan Kimberly" and "Everything"

Azar, Diana

DianaAzar 
Persephone 
The mourning mother does not interest 
me at all. Mothers always mourn. 
But the girl- where was she when 
the crippled god of darkness suddenly 
appeared? In the meadow linking 
clover chains, easily pulled apart? 
Or on Elysian playing fields arm 
in arm with her friends? 
She went unwilling, so they say. 
And yet she stayed through 
the long winter months buried inside 
the earthy dark and every spring 
when the light opened with the leaves, 
unhindered by him, she returned. 
The wonder isn't that she stayed 
down there with him sweating 
under a shower of sparks beside the forge, 
but that, having known his hot crafty hands, 
uncompelled, she ascended and returned. 


Persephone

Sandler, Scott

Three Poems: "Miss California Plays Around In Earthquakes" "Fractions" and "Dusk"

Cenkner, Annette

Annette C enkner 
Boom Babies 
There's nothing wrong with me just because 
my arms weren't meant to Rock-a-Bye a baby. 
And just because my elbow's not bent in 
that special way it takes to wipe a baby's behind, 
does not mean I've been left out of a 
secret female rite of passage that makes 
a woman a whole human being. 
I don't lament that I've missed out 
on the latest baby boom. You won't hear 
me complain about my lack oflabor pains. I'll 
never protest about my small milkless chest. 
But, whatever you do, 
don't talk to Princess Fergie, The Virgin Mary or 
my mom. They'll tell you swollen ankles are a 
blessed sign from God. 


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