“Snow Day”

For the third time in seventeen years
the University closes for snow--or so
the admin women tell me for this poem—

This morning three inches of snow balanced
along the telephone wires, death-defying
in the cold quaver of wind, then slip-sliding
into the orchard of snow-apple blossom
trees that lined the streets, spring in February,
like the morning the oldest child opened
the back door and saw on our red quince
the flowers of his first snow, how he laughed.
The storm is coming hard, they’ve sent us home
from work, the snow falls on, no telling how
much weight to bear, the boughs of the fir trees,
the branches of the bare trees bend down,
almost ready to break under the weight of our joy.

Minnie Bruce Pratt

Attribution-Non-Commercial-No Derivs
Creative Commons 2010

“Marking Up the Path”

A poem for the big weather coming our way!

Ice and snow have gotten under the skin of the trees,
scaley bark and trunk cold to my touch, so human,
so animal, standing there alone, while we, passing
by, have marked up the path with our tracks, bird
scratch, the sneaker footprints I followed for a while,
diamond-pattern overtaken by another, oval-sole,
in the confusion I made up a story, and then they
parted, leaving me alone with a fiction, and why I
write poetry, the stubborn, riled-up bark in my hand.

Minnie Bruce Pratt

Attribution-Non-Commercial-No Derivs
Creative Commons 2010

“Smelling Skunk”

Here’s how I know I live up North: it’s snowing,
I go out for my walk, the zest of ice stings my face,
the whole neighborhood smells like skunk. No,
I’m not putting here down, especially not the skunk,
poor fellow wanders the night streets to burrow
into shelter. But at home his black-and-white coat
(striped like that guy’s walking past), at home
that coat would get him all through winter outdoors.
Look: poverty is the same there as here, and not.
The trailer park Daniel writes about, the swampdirt
shit no sump the children run through and laugh,
the landlord takes the money and does nothing,
thin metal walls, like an oven baking in summer
indoors. Here the walls are brick thick plaster,
inside now people lean into the gas oven’s mouth,
heat reddens their faces like the sun’s breath.

Minnie Bruce Pratt

Attribution-Non-Commercial-No Derivs
Creative Commons 2010

“The Caws”

A poem for another cause--trans-species communication!
I wrote this last June--but saw the crows flying past my window
tonight and wanted to thank them for coming by.

What are the crows saying to each other?
Wouldn’t we all like to know? And—
Are they talking about us? Maybe,
sometimes. But—probably not.
We don’t know, though we poets
like to ventriloquize crow-wise,
longing to carry over meaning
from one being to another, word-
flinging, like when my pa said he
had the epizöotics when he felt bad,
the flu that flew around the world
in 1872, killing who knows how many
horses, all the way south to Cuba,
and as it passed humans grabbed
the word for ourselves. I thought
it was only his, he’d made it up,
and so it goes from age to age,
we stand at the crossroads of time
and history and whisper as the words
of those who’ve gone before pour
through our throats, we confabulate,
pontificate, prevaricate, we think
the words are ours. But not today.
Today I know what I’m hearing, the caws.
Today this poem belongs to the crows.

Minnie Bruce Pratt

Attribution-Non-Commercial-No Derivs
Creative Commons 2010

“Day Care”

Last week’s walk was a long drive, a short march,
two blocks, snow sifting down on us like sugar,
the children iced in pink and purple jumpsuits,
so sweet, so cold outside the county exec’s office,
him saying to their parents, teachers, friends, us,
budget, cut, waste, and shut, not saying rabble,
hovel, grovel, or balance the city like a top
spinning on the bent back of a woman telling us
right now she’s a full-time worker, full-time
student, full-time mother. Our signs yellow,
pink, green are like candy hearts with bitter
messages: CUTS = Jobs Lost we are yelling.
Shift the filter to black and white, you can see
how we learned to read, you running in and out
of books burning like houses, to find the ideas,
and me, floating on a raft of stories, the lonely
ocean inside my house. No one to talk to.
A teacher calls: Our children! we are yelling,
someone says we’re going in. The empty lobby
sits behind the plate glass windows like a lit,
warm classroom where we could teach a lesson.
Then—not yet. Just a kind of tilting forward.
Later your photos in black and white show
what the signs didn’t say: A man’s tattered
shirt, a woman’s hand pressed against,
that people were Latina, white and Black,
a child with a sign, not smiling, not frowning, ready,
just before his words marched out from his mouth.

For a news report on this demonstration
in support of day care in Buffalo, see
http://www.workers.org/2010/us/buffalo_0225/index.html

Minnie Bruce Pratt

Attribution-Non-Commercial-No Derivs
Creative Commons 2010