Poems
by Diane Webster

 

Polished Narcissus

 

The polished floor trips

the pedestrian to its level

to double the experience

in a reposed reflection,

 

a meeting of prone bodies

atop each other

both facing upward

to the ceiling

 

which doesn’t care

one fleck of paint

what lies below

except perhaps

 

it’s a disruption

of its Narcissus

admiration.

 

 

 

 

 

Rainbow Speed

 

The highway drowns

in morning rain –

a cautious pickup drives

with slower traffic

as I splash left to pass.

 

Sunlight catches

the pickup’s backsplash

arcing rainbow colors

on the highway’s horizon.

I slow to savor the phenomena

of 70-miles-per-hour rainbow speed

until we curve a different

angle in sunshine.

 

In the arc of windshield wipers

the backsplash smears away

in its own twin rainbows

not colorful at all.

 

 

 

 

 

Stroking

 

Stroke, stroke, stroke

as oars pull water

in swirly ripples

echoing out behind

the craft caught now

in a whirlpool

sucking, tugging

below, deeper

until water mirrors

shore in reflection

of self.

 

Stroke of luck.

Stroke of genius.

Stroke of buzzard wings

as Mom dies of a stroke.

 

 

 

 

 

Whopper Story

 

Before “Jaws” scared crowds

out of the ocean, beneath the surface

of the river a 20-foot sturgeon

story drifted among old fishermen

passed down to grandchildren

made believers by snapped lines

and monstrous swirls in lazy currents.

 

Afraid to peer in the water

from a boat’s edge to see a dark shape

or a drowned girl’s face

for a moment, a nightmare eternity

as your father nudges you

almost plunging you into the depths.

 

 

 

 

 

My Own Two Feet

 

I stand on my own two feet

reflected on lake shore.

Not alone but connected

to myself

constantly grounded.

 

Flip me upside down

I am balanced

on my own two feet;

no vertigo ripples

disturb my stance.

 

I stand on my own two feet

even as I wade away

my reflection hides,

but I believe in its survival

as sure as I feel

my own two feet.

 

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