the wind has lessened and the coyotes howl
their sweet sad song fills you with angst.
energy
the presentness the moment.
disturb this arid stillness
the cell towers missing, the traffic far away
lime iguana scurry under stones. bats swoosh
later the owls will sing their evening mantras.
sweat out the toxic
ephemera gathered round you like
dissolving in the mauve stillness.
like some magic soot.
who now does not want to live
has tried to make life stop.
this stillness
this light this time that could be hers
rise over the mountains or hear her cat’s purr
or her husband’s cackly loving laugh
People are distorted and paranoia reigns
Too much pain she says too much pain
braying dreadful sounds,
its ragtag clothes scatter and obscure
and this drowns out all beauty she
can take in in her dark almond vision
Come with me to this magic plain
Lie in the dusty ash feel the sky
there is magnificence along with the grit
Wait. Wait. Wait. Hold a bit longer.
Ellyn Joyce Rabinowitz’s poetry chapbook, Instinct for Survival, was published by Four Zoas Press, and her poems have been published by various literary magazines and small presses. She was a former editor and contributor at Moving Out, a feminist literary magazine based in Michigan, and a coordinator of poetry readings at First Majority, an art gallery in Berkeley, California. She wears many creative hats as a poet, writer, teacher, and exhibiting artist, and is a licensed psychotherapist and mediator in Nyack, NY, and New York City. Nonfiction work includes Surviving Loss (PP Press, 2001). Ellyn has been part of several writers groups in the Rockland County area and appreciates the opportunity to contribute to the Hudson Valley’s arts.