Three Poems by Patricia Furstenberg

 

Life Lived Backwards and Upwards

It will start with life moving backwards.
like a recording played in reverse
while us, stunned witnesses, will see stare silent
without even being required to testify.
first the trunks will sway
then the leaves will whoosh
and sway the breeze
that anchors the trees into the sky.
the clouds will float below, the sun pampered by them
while the rivers and the oceans
will pour uphill and rain upwards
no longer cushioned by earth
often unrestrained and none will expect them the clouds
to rain on us,
we will swim in dunes
and take shelter from the air
because the swallows and the bats and the egrets
will plunge and bring us food, morsels of fruit
while the dogs will growl at the tombs that shelter them,
cats will run away from mice
and we,
we will be born old, frail and lonely
walking faster with each day, catching up with our dreams
meeting one another, fusing into  family
as we grow younger and happier
until we will carelessly run chased by butterflies
laughing
till we’re but a sound,
a spec of light,
a dream
Life lived backwards.

Speaking Stones

“There were two birds who sat on a stone,”
flies through my mind as I read the gazette
(pixels on screen, not led on paper):
if we see the “Hunger Stones” we should weep.
I imagine a chapter from a dystopian novel
and prepare to scroll up
(index not dipped in mouth).
It’s the caption catching my foot,
I bump my big toe,
gasp in surprise.
I see numbers
upside down
engraved on a rock
as if the artist, on his knees,
carved and prayed.
This low - water rose in 1406
(I crane my neck, read inverted text).
This much lower in in 1943
(the year Mother was born, she’ll be 79 soon).
The lowest level ever,
stone still sharp and square,
not smoothed by sun, never stroked by hands
and close to its root that today reflects in the stream
that’s the caption I stumble upon,
from the Czech Republic,
a stone throw away from home-
The Lowest Water Level EVER.

“One flew away, and then there was one,”
flutters through my mind as my heart skips one.
I wonder if stones speak a language too
like Esperanto,
the one I learned in my youth.
Perhaps cornerstone,
a heavy tongue we’re slow to decipher,
and only now,
laden with meanings hard to break.
Pebbles were childhood treasures,
cradled in cupped hands,
slipped in shoeboxes,
making music in cans,
when a cornerstone was
only brick laid at the meeting of two walls,
and living stones were
painted garden rocks.
Stepping tiles told stories,
tetrapods did too
(I know they are not really made of stone).
So when have stones
become danger zones?

“The other bird flew after,”
taps my foot under the table
wondering if drawing water from a stone
will turn into a blooming business soon.
When my children were tiny
we would dance in a circle,
pretend to call the rain-
It’s been done all over the world,
in my native Romania too.
Perhaps that’s the language
of powdery stones,
of dust and rain,
the one clouds understand
and only those
pure at heart still speak.
Rolling stones gather no moss
was hip in my teens
when we still read papers
that spread out in telling rustle.
I learned about Nero from books
not by hiking an arid Tiber river in Italy
to touch a ghostly bridge.

“And then there was none,” the rhyme end,
like a crime fiction title fitting to solving cold cases,
like the tub rime on Lake Mead
in the southern United States.
So it’s not only in Europe,
water that elude us
while we dissolve in heat,
ghost towns emerging
from dry river beds still
painted blue on maps,
satellite-era records
of temperatures that parch the throat.
Sand clouds my vision
and I scroll further
“and so the stone
was left alone.”

 

Prophecy

 

When the last days will arrive
evil will be the common word
justice will seem to have vanished
good intentions too,
heartfelt gestures,
understanding
good thoughts, kind words
uttered at bedtime.
Only old people-
too weak and too scared
to say it out loud-
will remember
how a good thought sounded like
and all good will go to their graves.

When the last days will arrive
autumn will last through the winter,
winter will stretch into summer
and famine will rule
although men will be able to sow during any season
yet no one will ever remember
that there was a time for each seed.
for earth, too, will be tired.

kings and princes will care no more for their people
children will grow not knowing their fathers
perished in others’ wars,
and most will not know
their ancestors, being uprooted seeds.
forsaking their fate, embracing another,

for they’ll have no elders to turn to.
Too weak, tool old,
speaking in whispers to none
only the old people
will know how

to undo the prophecy.
For it can be done.

Patricia Furstenberg - With a medical degree behind her, writer and poet Patricia Furstenberg authored 18 books to date. The recurrent motives in her writing are unconditional love and war, while Patricia’s keen interest for history, folklore and dogs brought her writing, through a perfect loop, to her native Romania, Patricia being the creator of the hashtag #Im4Ro hashtag, sharing positive stories. 

Her writing appeared online in Romania Insider, Books by Women, Huffington Post UK, Biz Community SA, Secret Attic,  Poetry Potion, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Masticadores Rumania, The Poet Magazine, Spillwords Press, Plum Tree Tavern, Erato Magazine, Visual Verse, Militant Thistles (The Recusant), The Japan Society Haiku Corner, Medusa’s Kitchen, Academy of the Heart and Mind, Scarlet Dragonfly Journal and forthcoming:  The Kingfisher Journal, Poetry Pea Journal, Kalahari Review.  to name a few. 

She resides with her family in South Africa.