Collaboration Between Poet Marjorie Maddox and Artist/Photographer Karen Elias

Mothers and Daughters, by Karen Elias (USA) contemporary

Still, Life: 1950s

What can be said to the perfect mother
sitting stone still in the 1950s living room
where you never really lived? Poised, not reading 
words you cannot say, syllables that might crack

the stone sitting room? Still in the 1950s,
she smiles beautifully but doesn’t hear
words you cannot say, syllables that might crack
the polished stairway you creep down. Comfort?

There is none. She smiles but doesn’t hear
grief, pain, anything slightly unpleasant. Still,
you seek comfort, creep down the polished stairway.
Maybe this time she will turn her head, believe your

grief, pain. Instead, anything slightly unpleasant
goes unsaid. You protect her, this beautiful sculpture,
who might, this time, believe you, turn her head
and feel your scowl. It could destroy her,

this beautiful sculpture. The unsaid? The child protects 
the mother, who sits stone still in her 1950s living room.
Don’t allow her to feel the scowl that would destroy her.
You cannot say the words that might crack syllables,

alter the 1950s room, her life. She sits still as stone.
What can be said to the perfect mother?
Your syllables might crack her. Your child words
could destroy her poise, uncover where you really live.

What can be said to the perfect mother?
Poised, she smiles beautifully but doesn’t hear.
Why destroy both child and mother? You’ve never lived
outside cracked words you cannot say. Silent, still.

**

This poem was first published in Shiuli.

​

Poppies and the Cedar Tree, by Karen Elias (USA) contemporary

Poppies and the Cedar Tree 

What else could they be 
but planets and sun, coral glow 
of bloom tattered against dusk’s 

uneven waves of bark, slowly peeling
to reveal the underneath? Tangled 
temporarily in brittle twigs, they do 

not die but transform: bright 
miracles of surprise orbiting, 
cedar’s ashen fingerbones that release 

and heal with orange what rises 
and descends, what keeps circling 
in this sphere of sky, of us.

Two Poppies and the Fence, by Karen Elias (USA) contemporary

Two Poppies and the Fence

The best of neighbours, they ignore
boundaries, inquisitive countenance

            peering over into what we claim 
            as ours—rectangle of land, sky 

delineating what is paid for and possessed, 
which is why, at day’s end and beginning,

            we need them, each wide eye 
            and petaled chin trespassing

on morning coffee, on evening strolls 
around the cloistered yard that need 

            their joy, their bright exuberance 
            of orange, unsolicited and bold.

Curlew Sends Feelers into the World, by Karen Elias (USA) contemporary

​Hope Is the Thing with Feathers
 
(after Emily Dickinson)
 
The curlew is the thing 
with feathers, is the beak 
 
wildly waving wide ribbons
that hold back the strands 
 
of storm. That’s the thing 
about curlews, 
 
about hope. Red sky
in the morning....Warning 
 
and delight intersecting, 
flag-like ribbons curling 
 
into another day
maybe. The curlew is 
 
the thing. Even in the middle 
of a hurricane, even on a fragile 
 
bough while earth’s vast tornado 
of despair keeps widening, 
 
widening, the curlew is the thing 
with feathers, is the beak 
 
wildly waving its frayed 
but flapping ribbons 
 
of persistence, of hope. 
Red sky at night, 
 
sailor’s delight. Sky 
widening, widening into 
 
curlews, into hope. 
That’s the thing.
 
**
 
This poem was first published in Valiant Scribe. 

Curlew Witnesses Curlew Fire, by Karen Elias (USA) contemporary

​The Witnesses
            
after the 2018 wildfire in Curlew, Washington
 
Near the confluence 
of Long Alec Creek and the Kettle River, 
the curlew watches its namesake--
town of one hundred--
as residents stare toward the west, 
inhale fear. 
 
Smoke rewrites the sky 
where the curlew once flew. 
Flames attack its map and habitat. 
Ridgelines pulse with what is singed: 
feathers, pines, mountains, horizon
streaked with regret 
 
and the burnt promises
of those not there to witness,
the incineration of branch,
the contagion of spark,
the long, slow burn of loss.
 
O Curlew and curlews,
obscure enough to hide 
once within these safe acres,
even you Grief has found, 
even you.
 
**

Marjorie Maddox

**
 
This poem was first published in Valiant Scribe.
 
**

Professor of English and Creative Writing at Lock Haven University, Marjorie Maddox has published 14 collections of poetry—most recently Begin with a Question and the ekphrastic collections Heart Speaks, Is Spoken For (with Karen Elias) and In the Museum of Her Daughter’s Mind, a collaboration with her artist daughter, Anna Lee Hafer (www.hafer.work), and others. She also has published the story collection What She Was Saying and four children’s books. Two new collections of poetry are forthcoming in 2024. Please see www.marjoriemaddox.com 
 
Dr. Karen Elias, who taught college English for 40 years, is an artist/activist, using photography to raise awareness about climate change. Her award-winning work appears in private collections and galleries. She serves as board member of the Clinton County Arts Council, as membership chair, and as curator of the annual juried photography exhibit. In addition to Heart Speaks, Is Spoken For, collaborations with Maddox have appeared in such literary, arts, or medical humanities journals as About Place, Cold Mountain Review, The Ekphrastic Review, The Other Journal, Glint, Ekstasis, and Ars Medica. Elias, also a playwright, has had work chosen by the Climate Change Theatre Action and performed in eight countries.