Coyote Sky Homestead

The Uss Arizona, remembered?

The USS Arizona, remembered?

   Shoulders squared, Our Boys began to answer

The surprise even as they battled the fear

Sizzling inside their ears.  When the deathblow

Struck, they were trapped within the sinking womb,

And began their days of unanswered banging.

   In shallow blue she harbors that crew,

Whose skeletal fingers still clench vain fists

Against silted walls in stagnant water;

"And some of the portholes still have air,"

Onlookers say while tossing coins through the oily

Veil that a hatch patiently leaks to the surface.

Daphne P.

Haiku

In the moonlit night

A wolf is howling tonight,

But no one can hear.

Emily P.

Her Favorite Broom

Her Favorite Broom:

She sweeps

her blackened broom

across the pale linoleum;

its dimpled diamonds like

so many well-ordered mazes

with no possible way in or out.

She sweeps

her meticulous wand now bent

like a crescent moon from

always being left

propped against the nearest wall--

its own weight

crushing its dusty bristles;

a simple occasional turn

may have prevented such

malformation or even a steady

hook from which to hang, neatly.

She sweeps

her mysterious crook,

not sure where it came from,

but she knew it had been here long

before her--

she imagined it came with

the house, belonged to

another woman,

another pair of exacting hands--

a woman like herself with darkened curls,

certain convictions and frilly laced curtains.

Still, she sweeps

her functional witch stick

ever so careful, so precise,

reaching into ceiling corners,

catching webs, created delicately, yet

resilient, so firmly entwined

that she never gets every wisp.

Instead, the remains dangle

like holocaust shivers;

sometimes she watches them

swaying in a draft and

she wants to swing from them.

Daphne P.