The Senile Ghosts

The whiff of Pall Mall

floats across the room,

drifts in front of my eyes,

drawing a steep river bank and us 

skinny-dipping in shallow water.

The fragrant sketch revives

a hopeful evening.

Senile ghosts haven’t wised up

and crashed my Halloween party.

They thought they could change the world

but broke their wings in drunken binge

while skinny-dipping in shallow water.

The ghosts believe they run the world

because the moon agreed to swim along

in the river of missed opportunities

and misread observations,

hiding the ripples of wrinkles

below the silver rays.

The tops of maples and oaks

gleam orange and gold; 

the berserk ghosts dash down

the steep riverbank

like headless chickens.

With increasing alarm,

I open the doors and windows,

praying for a draft to carry away

the whiff of Pall Mall.

© Helen Kanevsky, 2019

Image courtesy of The Spectator

Dazzling Dinoflagellates

We gather when the moon is hidden

in earth shadow, stand in a group to hear facts,

take advice, don life jackets that cover our lungs,

our hearts.  We drive toward a cove at the

salt sea edge where the plankton proliferate,

persist in a small shallow bay with its twisted neck

to the sea, its reef a wall that holds them in.  These

bright, tiny organisms, single cell, simple we call them,

beckon us to witness their wonder. Under wisps

of night light we load into kayaks, follow one

dim beacon. Only paddle sounds dipping, dripping,

pulling on water.  Last light tucks under the earth,

dark descends fully, fills the space that holds us. 

The enchantment begins.  Under every boat

a lining of light, each paddle's dip is a brush

painting sparkle.  Even the fish surface

in small blue spotlights, descend exposed.

These uncountable beings dance ghostly

glimmering with every splash we make.

I sink my arm in the cool cove, skin glows

blue.  Lift lighted water in both cupped hands,

let it fall back twinkling into the bay, dots of glitter

on my fingers, my palm -- I am holding starlight.

© Marti Snell, 2016

(Snell, Martha E. “Dazzling Dinoflagellates.” Streetlight Magazine, Fall, 2016. Issue No.19, Web 16 October. http://streetlightmag.com/2016/12/09/dazzling-dinoflagellates-by-martha-snell/)

Bioluminescent Algae at Vieques Bay, Puerto Rico
courtesy of jenonajetplane.com

Moon Landing +50

It rained most of that week

So we couldn’t see it anyway

with the naked eye

And the grainy TV imagery

and the muffled voices

From a quarter million miles away

This orbed story seeming so alien

to my lifeguard lifestyle

and the big concert

Coming up in a couple weeks

over in New York State

Or that moony girl

who kept draping herself

         on my white guard stand,

Recalling that when Apollo was announced

We believed what the President said

before Vietnam

And Watergate and stagflation

Opened a continental latrine trench

Between the government

and the people,

Nearly failing to mention that this was only

another Frontier story

another land grab

Of empty spaces occupied by nothing

or mere heathens thus

Ripe for that special Christian rapacity

         forgiven in advance

for bringing the Word

to the wilderness,

Awakening too late to the bitterly plain

         truth that that savage

wisdom is what we needed

All along to keep this singular

blue pearl

From becoming a charcoal-dusted

cratered place

Where a white man’s bootprint

lasts a million years.

          © Bill Prindle, 2019

Apollo 11 bootprint, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons