Five Poems by Mary Ellen Talley

 

Children Get Their Just Desserts

 

The trick to making fluffy children

is using quality whipping cream

with high butter fat content.

Wherever said children are lollygagging

during dinner preparations,

place them in appropriate containers.

Use manual beaters.

No need for children to be

apprehensive. They will love

the attention and basking in foam.

Younger children produce

better results due to higher

fat content. For that reason,

teenagers are not ideal.

Stainless-steel beaters work well.

 

Whip those children in the tub,

on the playground, in school,

out of school, even on their way

to the dentist, whip, whip, whip.

Children with naturally curly hair

foam up faster than those with long

straight hair. Parents may wish

to keep their children at their peak

of freshness in a Tupperware bowl

in the fridge. It is recommended

that you do not seal the bowl

as fluffy children need to breathe.

Serve the just whipped children

atop homemade pumpkin pie

for Thanksgiving dinner. This dessert

serves two purposes. Creamy & sweet

especially if two tablespoons sugar

and a half teaspoon vanilla extract

are added toward the end of whipping.

Do not energetically rewhip froth 

after removing fluffy children from the fridge.

Folding stiff white peaks gently with a spoon

will gather up any liquid that has separated.

 

Besides taste, an additional benefit

to this holiday delight is that when children

rest in stiff peaks atop pumpkin pies

they give their parents ten minutes

to eat in peace. Although not recommended,

family dogs or cats will be eager to lick

spoons, bowls, and beaters. It’s quite alright.

Many fluffy children prefer this

to taking a bath before bed.

 

Where Will My Dust Be in Five Thousand Years?

            with a cautionary line from C. D. Wright

 

1.

I call out Namaste at the end of dream yoga.

 

A train keeps traveling west across the Plains states.   I want my father

to turn his head toward me.   He checks his pocket watch at the exact

moment I am waving.

 

The engine heads through the tunnel at Newgrange five minutes after

solstice has ended.   The engineer dares not touch rough edges of dawn.

 

I keep forgetting the Gaelic pronunciation for A Hundred Thousand Welcomes.

Once again, I memorize Cead Mile Failte. 

2.

This beautiful blue orb has a twelfth-of-never chance of recuperating. 

3.

Sometimes nature twists itself or us galley wampus. Asymmetry isn’t

obvious as long as leaves cover branches.   Look at sword ferns growing

out of cedar bark. I want to be a mother tree. It is risky to be so reliable

 

A hundred thousand daffodils surrounding sturdy trees are in full bloom.

Bright primroses startle the shadows.

 

A squirrel scampers across the path. Two more claw their way up a trunk

and maneuver along a horizontal branch. Perhaps they could fly across the

path if I wasn’t in the way 

 

Soon crows may scavenge the carcass of the dad rat at the edge of the path

if their hunger is blatant.    If not, an owl could feast tonight.

 

Sunflower Smoke Hovers at Dusk

 

I have witnessed Night and Death as I walk

under green canopies collecting blue leaves.

The grey-hooded girl holding a lily

grieves near a crypt with butterfly doors.

                                    I am the groundskeeper,

I have seen the clay pit where the girl digs

stone pillows for her little sister. Some are memories

I offer to polish, wrap in ribbon and return to her.

                                    She has a few hours

to offer solace to the little one before white petals fray

at the edges. The redhead, herself, has many years

until she will join her sister in sleep. 

                                    I startle big sister

as I turn the key in the gate. It is as if metal wings

flutter in twilight. Gone sister, in ten-year old tangled hair,

inhales scent of the gifted lily and adjusts her new pillow

                                    as light from the lily

frames her face. She touches a butterfly wing

on her sister’s hoodie before the retreat from this visit

until next year. Before leaving, big sister tells news

of Day which they both know is no more than waiting.

                                    Crows hoard sunflower seeds

                                    in the dawn haze.

 

Analog Hula-hoop

We pick on scabs from the underbelly

of memory. My mother fried lean hamburger

and opened a can of green beans on every balcony

when she went upstairs to look at the moonscape

while me, I graded spelling papers she carried

with ocelots in her shoulder bag. She rode the bus daily

like a centipede pretending to be a grasshopper

and tried to transform herself just like you did

when your grandmother gave you a pinch pot

of chocolate yarn in a shortbread crust

of derangement. You could’ve escaped it all

in a hula hoop made of analog clocks. Of course,

the hands hooked you even though you offered

to repair the gears with digital saddle shoes. 

 

Cuttings

 

Itch on my finger grows from the briers

where I am cutting roses for a bouquet.

The roses maraud scenic delight and overflow

the vase on my table.  In no time, itch

turns to scratch, gaining purchase on my finger

under my wedding ring. Skin wends raw.                   

I twist the circle off my wide knuckle,

rubbing the recommended cream,

but still, my itch persists. I cut off my finger.

My wrist begins to itch. I cut off my left arm.

Being right-handed, it is still easy to reassure myself

how adaptable I am becoming. The itch persists,

so I cut off my shoulder. When the time comes

to remove the first lobe of my heart, those roses

on my table furl at the edges of their iridescence.

Petals fall on my cleaved body parts.

Lie on the hammock, they whisper.

The briers will spread no longer today.

Mary Ellen Talley’s poems have recently been published in literary journals including Gyroscope, Raven Chronicles, The Plague Papers, and Banshee as well as in several anthologies. Her work has received three Pushcart nominations. Her chapbook, “Postcards from the Lilac City” was published by Finishing Line Press in 2020.