SAMPLE POEMS
Copyright ©2015 by V. Jane Schneeloch

Pulp

It is easy to forget
while I write about trees
that I am writing on them.
Not the old copper beech,
that generous publisher,
who accepts all
incisive submissions.

No, what I write on
was fed into a mill
like the one in Rumford
where the log is sacrificed
for the sheet,
and the stench of it
permeates the air –

spruce, pine
sawed, pulped,
offered up
as sacramental gift –­
now
a leaf before me.
What will I make of it?

Original Gift

Thank you, Eve,
for approaching the tree,
for yielding to temptation,
for choosing knowledge
over obedience.

Thank you for
the fruit of choice,
a taste of possibility
beyond the soft, green
walls of Eden.

How is it paradise
not to taste the sweetest fruit,
not to know what lies beyond,
to live forever
comfortably unaware?

Bound

Words
surround me
like hard parentheses

I cannot touch
beech story
I cannot dance
birch catkin
I cannot sing
maple sweetness

Within
these stubborn curves
I await
silent release.

Uncontained

Belief is as hard as a hickory nut
that, cracked, holds many mansions.
Pat Schneider

If my belief were a hickory nut
I’d keep it safe in my pocket
easy to find with fumbling fingers.
When challenged
I’d take it out
say “Here, see this.
This is what I believe.”

But my belief won’t be contained,
won’t stay in pockets
any more than the green gloves
lost last week,
or milkweed fluff
or dry oak leaves
or yellow butterflies.

A Clover, One Bee, and Revery

My students did not understand
why she wrote alone in her room
at that tiny table,
why she hid from visitors,
shared bread and verse
in a basket lowered from her window.
They said “boring” and “hermit” and “weird.”

Perhaps, I suggested,
the world beyond the fence
was too huge and sharp
for one who studied
butterfly wings and slithering snakes.
My answer did not accommodate
their view of the world,
nor did it satisfy me.

On this bluest of July days
I consider their questions again.
The sparrows chatter,
the mourning dove coos,
a child on the next block
practices her whistle,
the stargazer lily
leans out toward the sun.
I feel the brush of Riley’s tail
as he scouts the gray squirrel
walking the points of the fence.
I smell the basil by the back door.
It is enough.

Hydrangeas

1

Excise excise excise
cut
grass
tree limbs
weeds
breast
cut out
unneeded
unwanted
unnecessary
slice
bad from good
sick from well
old from new

Excise excise excise
shining axe
knife
scalpel
where do you land your edge
where is the border
between sacrifice and spoil?

2

Prune back the hydrangeas
and they will grow fuller next year
Surrender the full pink blossoms
for the promise of future blooms.

3

Diagnosis
the third surgery
Green edged blossoms beginning to open
will be brown by the end of radiation.

4

Old arching branches
that bent to the ground are gone
gnarled trunks now visible
no longer shaded behind the flowered skirt.

Last Visit with Gertrude

I sit between
her bed
and the window

She spoons
yogurt and honey
from the mug
nestled
into the small red pillow
on her chest

Outside
an old maple
casts its giant shadow
on fresh snow
birds forage
for sustenance

She licks
the last
of the yogurt
from her spoon

Alice adjusts
her pillow
so she can
look at me
and the window
beyond

We talk
of poetry
and inspiration

She tells me
Always
have a paper and pencil
to catch
the firefly moment
before it passes

It is the light
in her eyes
that catches me

the illumination
that shines
out
between
her words

like
light escaping
between
the slats
of the barracks.