Mouth Carved Shut: Ekphrastic Poems

I wrote last month about the road trip I took with some friends to visit the Museum of Fine Arts Houston and participate in the ArtLines Juried Competition.  This week I've been working on those poems.  Here are three of them, along with the works that inspired them.

ANTHROPOMORPHIC HARP
Wrapped in the trunk of a Sapele tree
I heard an elephant bathing in
the rainforest bai.  Light poured down through the leafy
canopy; every beam sugared carbon
strings into mahogany heartwood.  This
was before the sawmills, the tree
hewn by hand, bush cricket my first music. 
Forged copper scraped me a hollow body,
elegant neck, elongated head achieved
by binding the infant skull.  The sharpest
blade cut me a mouth.  The green mantis
folded its arms and prayed.  I was made to be
African elsewhere.  I never learned
Mangbetu language, its voiced and unvoiced
trill.  I speak only with a mouth carved shut.

 

JADE HAND

This is my blade hand, cutting through
    rainforest vines
    enemy flesh
    false hope
    flattery
on my way to you.

Before it can fade, hand over
    the cheek slap
    what’s in your wallet
    peony bouquet
    our love
and I’ll keep it safe for you.

This jade hand-shaped pendant, look at it
    blue-green translucent
    ripple like ocean waves
    stiff with regal power
    empty to the gods
now drilled with holes, waving at you.

 

ALLEGORY OF EUROPE

It’s a gamble, a gaming
purse tossed on the floor
and open for business.

Blue velvet and the ace
of spades, space available
in another place not here.

Riches by chance, bitches!
Advance token, pass go,
past those other monkeys.

Keys to the city withheld,
meld Igbo and Bantu pell-
mell into Africa.  Scramble.

Comments

[Feminema]

[Off topic]: I'm writing because I'm a big fan -- such a big fan, in fact, that I've nominated you for the Versatile Blogger Award (see information here: http://feminema.wordpress.com/2012/01/04/versatile-blogger-award/). And I'm promising myself to comment more on your brilliant site, which I read religiously!

cheers
Feminéma

[Lisa Moore]

Feminema! You have made my day. Look for a post from Seattle's EMP Museum later this week, and thanks for reading. Lisa.

[Diana Davidson Dick]

Lisa, your words are spare, well chosen, precise, with a cadence that flows with each world you write about. Love Auntie Di

[Lisa Moore]

Thank you Auntie Di!