Sappho's Sparrows



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Sappho's Sparrows Meredith Stricker
SAPPHO'S SPARROWS a series of messages, exchanges & encounters "beautiful swift sparrows whirring fast beating wings" "from the dark earth through the mid-air" Sappho, fragment 1 *Sappho, though the technology has changed* I am walking straight toward you, listening. Dry grass and American words are all I have to reach you. And this small clay figure of a boy whose belly is warm with dust, the thumbprint warm on the boy who makes us lie down and we lie down so that even flies love our skin & a woman speaks dark in each ear. While in this bright air, a man is hammering against marble that flares everything white in the sound of cicadas & wind. The invisible is not hiding. Appearance is not hollow clothing. Not a shell. The doves are your doves. Not emblems. Not hidden. They are close as the water's clear salt and where my heart dives no less. *inhabited by your absence* "only one complete poem survives Sappho's nine books of lyrics" plowed field just at sunset stones, black sea urchins, sand the wash of salt candles, soap, white cup from the trellised marketplace bells, counting aloud everywhere your words have been torn away scant shelter of thistles, thin rain, shadow puppets, the moon yellow over blue Asia Minor each fragment — a lacuna of perception — shadows the unseen clear glass of water, the sound of waves just as transparent as olive groves drawing light into their leaves & fruit there are so many places to find you in the endless white spaces you have left us a telegram from S hastily translated BELIEVE THIS LUCENT MOUTH FLOWERING SHRINES -- EVERYTHING SEEN (no exclusion) a later footnote appeared on green paper wrapped around a stone near the porch steps EROS -- "TRANSFORMATIONAL ACTIVITY" -- THE POEM A LONG FALL INTO INTELLIGENCE in love with WHITE SEA CLIFF EDGE, PATH THROUGH CYPRESS, WHERE WE'RE HEADED eyes open *maps to the cliff edge* . . . . . . . .what is visible. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . carries us inside. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [what is visible]. . . . . . . .takes us close . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . as the moon . . . . . . increases. . . . . . . . what is visible increases . . . . . . . . recovers. . . . . . . . . [is shining] . . . . . . . . & clear, cicadas. . . . . . . .the actual grows larger. . . . . . . . takes us far. . . . . . . [is not hiding]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Ochre wax. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [white] . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . washed rock. . . . . . . . oregano. . . . . . . .a gate. . . . . . . . .[Young mother] . . . . . . . . blue swallow. . . . . . . . .It is not a trick. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .this gravel path. . . . . . . . laurel leaves. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . climbing roses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . we are. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . not turned away. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . *the quality of mercy* holds out her hand. . . . . . I go walking in the dark . . . . . . . . . . .porcelain face in the grass. . . . . . . . . . . . worn, milky blue, a charm. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Her face is sepia and gentle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . come to me beyond all roses and praise . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . My heart is a grammar lesson lark who sings as the grain beats green on our legs, a field that flame does not burn, it must be light, it must be secret our walking there. . . . . . hollows in the turf. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . white stones in a line. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . the machines can't mow water down . . . . . . . . . . . . she raises the light in her hand . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . across the night field all that is lost. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . *the orchard* 'as the sweet-apple reddens on the bough-top' -- Sappho, fragment 105 mutsu, keepsake, russet irregular, fertile treasury of names in the mouth eating the imagined, we lie in late fall grasses deep green moving inside caves of happiness the creek shines nearby for coyotes, foxes & deer invisible in this wild garden, temporary peace between the cultivated & what lives outside our naming *dear reader* You wanted to see a picture of me. Here's one way. and 2 seconds later: yours, S *shopping list* `. . .robe. . . saffron. . . purple robe . . . cloak . . . garlands . . .' -- Sappho, fragment 92 purple & russet silk gold flame pattern birdwing throat scent of sunflower pollen myrrh & pale jasmine iridescent water weave grass green rose dust falls loosely over shoulders plum leaf: haze, light spilling water bowl, a morning of skin skimming freshly woven *to speak in smells, as one animal to another* I. *ravens calling at sunrise* how poplar stems smell, slightly *& sunset* bitter where they join red & green sun on granite the heat inside *what matters most* dirt close to the shovel, grease on axle bearings, red cloth smeared with pine pollen & resin, fresh morning air: a catch at the throat very cold & bright locked aluminum casing, titanium wire, sparks across electrodes refrigerated egg, an idea held tight & clear in the mind an idea held II. *Orion grows brighter,* smell of inches & leaves, the dust of armchairs & books, copper a way out & into anything hammered mended & torn again *first sun in weeks* falling & falling inside yourself how wonderful: bright flicker of quartz & numerous birds at the heart: filament & arc, seam of skin the catch, the locket, the edge: net full of water & equally empty *what to give up & what to hold onto:* the interior of hair, the way he parts his hair to prove it's not a pelt, the respectable man with his arms frantically upraised: "I am not an animal", he cries, all evidence to the contrary, "I am not an animal". Betrayed by breath & bone, every pore, every follicle reveals, every smell, every scrap of body betrays & saves us *moving where?* that paradise of upheaval, the exact place you find yourself now net full of water III. *what you used to think was weak* smell of newly opened iris & lilacs *& now find is alive and incredibly strong* oak leaves under fresh snow, the story moving backward *sliding into thaw* rust & metal shavings *excess of melting, joyous* ripe mulberries overhang summer lake, floating *like a swan, a freefall* return to the world *read this book of rainwater* book made entirely of smells & silence *"blue: the sea, the sky, the unknown"* a stone to pound open green almond husks -- white inside the seed inside the seed finding the moon reflected in waves \ another mystery: the deep blue sea made of clear water how our eyes create love *lumen: light, eye, opening* "and the whole place shadowed by roses" -- Sappho, fragment 2 shadow cast by the moving shade of plane trees voluntary blindness, acquired patiently with great & hopeless effort a place so deep light can only enter as an idea plummeting more deeply into this unclothed abundance "empty space or missing part": hollowed : lumened luein < luein > a loosening lyre of × × × × × × × × unbound light