THE RIVER

The River

Here the elements converge – earth, air, water, light.

         The river surface a rippling mirror of color

         in motion, blue sky, gray clouds, green

                  and amber canopies of leaves.

                  Turtles slip from rocks,

                           trout snap at insects. Deer, song bird,

                           fox, coyote, heron – predator and prey gather

                                    on its banks, laced with moss and peat.

                                    Lush with life, death. Autumn leaves,

                           decaying flesh and vegetation

                           settle into the fetid, fertile silt,

                  nourish river life the way

                  memories nourish the living.

         Amorphous, the river absorbs

         spring rains, gains strength,

                  swells with torrents,

                  folds in on itself,

                           folds oxygen into

                           foaming white waters.

                                    In summer, the shallow river flows,

                                    in winter, frozen over, beneath it flows.

                                             Still the river remains constant,

                                             knows its path. If you become lost,

                           follow the river as it meanders

                           down the mountain, makes its way

                  from source to mouth,

                  just as blood knows

                           its way around the body,

                           traveling from and to the heart.

- Diane Dolphin

The River first appeared in Poetry and Art, gallery exhibit and anthology, Wickford Art Association, RI, 2016. © 2016 Diane Dolphin. All Rights Reserved.

RESONANCE

Resonance

Last evening, as I drove home

along the old back roads,

with the maples lulling

their colors to sleep

and yellow lights

blinking on in

quiet houses,

I thought,

this is right,

this much I know,

and the violin and

Emmylou crooned in agreement

with me, and I felt myself break open

the way storm clouds broke open, spilling light,

as if from their souls, across the fields

as we walked along the orchard ridge

lined with young pear trees

under the fractured sky,

and as we made our

way to the pond,

the blue heron

took flight

before us.

Resonance was first published in Bridgewater Review (2016, Bridgewater State University).  
© 2016 Diane Dolphin. All Rights Reserved.

All Would Be Still

All Would Be Still

The rhododendrons

have hunkered into winter.

Thin, intertwined birches

reflect perfect twins

on the surface of the freshwater inlet.

Tall tawny grasses along water’s edge

waver so slightly, it’s like watching

a lover breathe.

All would be still, but the sparrows—

frenetic—flit, dart, dive,

alight on slight branches,

startle others who burst skyward

or drop to the ground.

They appear to collide midair,

break apart like split atoms.

Shrill quarrels pierce

the windowed wall through which

I watch.

I wish I could paint for you

flashes of crimson breast or blue crest

but they’re the color

of wintered leaves.

This is not a still life, and I

do not sit on a museum bench.

The sky has dulled, unsettled.

Pale sunlight peers from beyond

the firs. I pull on my coat,

slide open the glass door.

All Would Be Still was first published in Bridgewater Review (2016, Bridgewater State University). 
 © 2016 Diane Dolphin. All Rights Reserved.

Counting in Circles (Eighth Anniversary)

Counting in Circles

(Eighth Anniversary)

I remove 4 red roses from the dozen, don’t want to

discard them, although they’re already dying.

For the 8^th year, his parents and brothers pull up in two cars

at Swan Point and we meet in the garden.

For the 8^th time, his mother wonders if he hears us and I

tell them how my grandmother always said she still talked to

my grandfather, how I’d tell her that’s natural and she’d say

but he talks back.

For the 7^th time, we joke about putting the dog’s ashes in

beside his and would there still be room for me.

For the 8^th time, she says he’s not here and I say

I still feel him in the house and then we get in our cars

and drive to the restaurant on the river for her birthday.

Today she is 90. Her son was 58. In 7 years I will become

older than him, just as I outgrew my mother at 41.

For the 2,920^th day, I tell myself stories about us. Once upon

a very finite time in a very particular place. But then

there’s quantum physics. Once my husband grabbed me

as I stepped off the curb and I saw myself split off, get smacked

by the passing bus.

If we could choose our date of demise would we?

So we knew exactly what we were counting up to,

counting down to. Would the dimension of each day

expand or contract in relation to what remained?

Scientists spend lifetimes radioing signals into galaxies, listening

for thousands-year-old calls. Tonight, I sit in my driveway, watch

the stone walls of my 200-year-old cottage shift color in the fading

light and think if I’m going to stay I might as well go inside,

take off my coat and own it a while.

Counting in Circles (Eighth Anniversary) was first published in Bridgewater Review (2016, Bridgewater State University). © 2016 Diane Dolphin. All Rights Reserved.

Christmas Eve, The Hill

How the the tall fir feathers the sky.
The trees wait, barely breathing
fragile bones trembling.
That blue could be this pale.
© 2016 Diane Dolphin. All Rights Reserved.

Big Thoughts

Big Thoughts

So I was just sitting there thinking —

you know, big poet thoughts,

and I looked over at my dog who

was sitting and staring at me like

he was wondering what I was thinking.

Ziggy, are you self-actualized? I asked,

and he tilted his head and looked puzzled

so I asked again.

Are you self-actualized, Ziggy? And

his eyes got huge and he looked bewildered

like he was saying,

I don't know, am I?

Diane Dolphin
 - In Memory of Little Ziggy

"Big Thoughts" first appeared in the micro-chapbook, Big Thoughts, published by Origami Poems Project.

(c) Diane Dolphin. All Rights Reserved.

HOPE STREET: POETRY BOOK READING AND RECEPTION

PLEASE JOIN US at the reading and reception to celebrate the publication of "Hope Street: Nine New England Poets on Love and Loss"

Hope Street Reading and Reception

Sunday, September 21, at 3 PM

Symposium Books, East Greenwich

Join us at Symposium Books for a Book Launch Reading and Reception to celebrate the release of Hope Street: Poems on Love and Loss, a chapbook anthology of Loft poets published by Main Street Rag, 2014. Reading and Reception with pastries, snacks, and refreshments. Meet the poets and share your own poems on love and loss at the Open Mic following the reading. (Sign Up 30 min. before the reading.)

Poems by: Nancy E. Brown, Michael Crowley, James Cronin, Diane Dolphin, Joan Fishbein, Karen Haskell, Beatrice Lazarus, Sandra Moran, and Maureen Lapre.

"... in these superbly crafted poems is the weight of modern life's disappointments and the lasting shine of possibilities."
--Lori Desrosiers, author of The Philosopher's Daughter

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July 25th: Wickford Art Association Poetry & Art Opening Reception

July 25th is the opening of the Wickford Art Association's Poetry & Art Exhibit at the Wickford Art Association gallery. Opening reception is Friday the 25th from 6:30 - 8:30. Meet the exhibiting artists and poets! This was a phenomenal show last year; I'm anticipating it will be again. The synergy of words and image was intriguing, thought provoking and enlightening. In this show, poets were invited to respond to visual art pieces created by local artists. (And yes, I do have a poem in the show). Not to mention it's on the bay with a gorgeous view.

The show will run July 25th to August 17th.

Please Join Us Sunday, May 18 at Symposium Books

Hope you can join us at the Origami Poems Project "Meet the Authors" event at Symposium books on Sunday May 18th from 2:00 - 5:00.  I will be reading with silent lotus. The event will also feature music, refreshments and an open mic, so bring your own poem to read! For more information, click on the link below.

May 18th - OPP Meet The Authors Event

Order my Poetry Collection, No Longer Always

https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product_info.php?products_id=1222

POEM: "I am Twenty-Four," by Diane Dolphin

I am Twenty-Four,

buckled into an airplane seat, tangible consequence

of that drunken night a month ago at Leo’s bar

where I’d bragged about backpacking foreign cities

and shores with my camera and notebook.

Dublin’s my first destination, I slurred; it came out destiny.

So you always say — when? asked Laurel, her friends —

my new friends — egging me on.

She walked me to the gate and kissed me.

            Revving engines; I brace for G-force, the lift,

                                                lurch and tumble of turbulence.

The woman beside me in blue boiled wool — my mother’s age,

had she lived — looks up, smiles vaguely,

turns her page.

The flight attendant drags out the drink cart, a sign of faith

that this tonnage will not plummet, that somehow

the currents will sustain us. I wash down a seasickness pill

with Jamesons and ginger ale,

drift on the honey scent of Laurel’s hair, aware of how

her eyes mirror the cyan sea ranging

boundlessly beneath me.

Copyright (c) 2014 Diane Dolphin. "I am Twenty-Four," was published in the Naugatuck River Review (Winter, 2014), and was a Semi-Finalist in the Naugatuck River Review 2013 poetry competition.

Hope Street: Nine New England Poets on Love & Loss

I'm so pleased to be included in this anthology, in good company with all these other fine poets from The Loft, including Bea Lazarus, Jim Cronin, Karen Haskell, Joan Fishbein, Maureen Lapre, Michael Crowley, Nancy Brown and Sandra Moran.

The anthology includes my poems, "The Worst Dream," "Mirage" and "Tenderness." You can order copies today by clicking on the link below:

Hope Street, available through Main Street Rag

Reading for "Up Do" book launch at Books on The Square in Providence

"Night Shift" A Poem by Diane Dolphin

Night Shift

Diane Dolphin

In the dead of sleep she wanders

down into the basement of her mind.

She sifts through clutter, sorting papers,

unpacking and repacking keepsakes,

shifting piles from one corner to another.

She sits on a crate, poring through albums

of photos, torn clippings of conversations,

late night whispers saved on scraps of linen,

detailed notes from old arguments.

She replays home movies, losing herself

inside them. Sometimes, the slant of sun and shadow

in the garden, the feel of his voice wrapped around

her name, the smell of Sunday coffee and eggs

fill her with light and she rises

through the worn floors into the perfect black sky,

the stars sharp as shattered glass. But as night gives way

to pre-dawn gray, as her bedroom walls indiscernibly shift

from gray to lilac, as rose and violet seep into the flowers

on her quilt, green into the leaves and the silk robe laid over

the chair, blue into the irises of her eyes, now open,

still in her mind, she is circling, circling above

the detritus, searching for a place to land.

"Night Shift" was first exhibited & published in Poetry & Art, Exhibit & Book, Wickford Art Association, 2013. 

(c) 2013 Diane Dolphin. All Rights Reserved.

Wickford Art Association's Poetry & Art Exhibit

Hi, folks,

Check out the Wickford Art Association's Poetry & Art Exhibit at their gallery in Wickford, RI.  They've got a great show where they selected poems and then had visual artists create art work in response to the poems. Talk about a meeting of the left and right brains! The reception on Aug. 9th and the poetry reading last night were magical. 

My poem, "Night Shift," is included in the exhibit, as was a graphic piece by Amy Schupler Venear in response to my poem. You can also purchase a fabulous exhibit book featuring all the  poems and artwork from in the show, and proceed will go to the RI Community Foodbank. The exhibit closes on Aug. 25th!

POEM: AUGUST by DIANE DOLPHIN

Well, it's mid-July and we're into the 4th or 5th day of our third heat wave so far. Here's a poem you can probably relate to -- perhaps I should rename it, "July."

AUGUST

The air so thick

you suck it through your teeth like a lime gin jello shot

except for lithe and lightly powdered

ladies in rainbow sherbet sun

dresses who part their

watermelon flavored

lips ever so

slightly

and sip

it.

“August” first appeared in The Rhode Island Writers' Circle 2010 Anthology and was also published in the “Poetic License” column by Tom Chandler in the Providence Journal.

(c) Diane Dolphin, 2008. All rights reserved.

POEM: "After the Storm" from Postcards from the Solstice - New OPP Microchapbook

AFTER THE STORM

We emerge, blinking. Sunlight

unleashes color’s spectrum

from a canvas of white.

The Golden twirls with glee,

breaks into runs and tumbles –

explosions of snow!

The Sheltie, chest deep in drifts,

throws his head back, barks thanks

to the sky.

From Postcards from the Solstice, published by Origami Poems Project. (c) 2013 Diane Dolphin

Check out my latest microchapbook published by the Origami Poems Project. The OPP produces tiny, origami chapbook collections and distributes them FREE all around Rhode Island. Their motto is "FREE POETRY"!  http://www.origamipoems.com/poets/66-diane-dolphin