I discovered this poem in the 80's and it has been my favorite poem ever since ... written by Robert Penn Warren and first published in The New Yorker in 1981. At this point in my life ... almost 76 years ... it means even more ... and I'm listening. 

 

~What Voice at Moth-Hour

 

What voice at moth-hour did I hear calling

As I stood in the orchard while the white

Petals of apple blossoms were falling,

Whiter than moth-wing in that twilight?

 

What voice did I hear as I stood by the stream,

Bemused in the murmurous wisdom there uttered,

While ripples at stone, in their steely gleam,

Caught last light before it was shuttered?

 

What voice did I hear as I wandered alone

In a premature night of cedar, beech, oak,

Each foot set soft, then still as stone

Standing to wait while the first owl spoke?

 

The voice that I heard once at dew-fall, I now

Can hear by a simple trick. If I close

My eyes, in that dusk I again know

The feel of damp grass between bare toes,

 

Can see the last zigzag, sky-skittering, high,

Of a bullbat, and even hear, far off, from

Swamp-cover, the whip-o-will, and as I

Once heard, hear the voice: It's late! Come home.

 

 

Robert Penn Warren

The Hayfever Blues

by jeanne rené

 The Hay Fever Blues

Well I,
Get up outta bed,
Go straight tah the head,
My eyes are a itch’n,
And my nose is a twitch’n,
Man, it’s bewitch’n!
Cause I got . . . those hayfever bah - looze.
Lord so many ah - chooze.
I don’t know what tah dooze . . . ya see
Cause I got,
Cause I got . . . those . . . May fever,
Day fever. Say what fever?
Hay fever bah - looze.

Well I’m,
Up in front of the class,
Don’t give this teacher no sass!
My eyes are all leak’n,
My ears are ah tweek’n,
The tissues a seep’n . . . now . . .
Since I got these hayfever bah - looze.
Can ‘ford no tissue to looze
And I just don’t know what tah dooze,
Since I got,
Since I got . . . this scratch in my throat
Class, now don’t rock the boat!
Just let me emote. . . these hayfever blues.

Lordy, Lordy,

Well I,
Throw open my door,
Just can’t take no more,
Leave all that pollen behind
But, Lord, what do I find,
My man, he’s a itch’n . . .
And ain’t that his nose a twitch’n,
Guess we can’t be a fix’n
The sneeze’n and sniff’n . . . with these hayfever bah-looze,
We’re gonna die from all dem ah-chooze!
We don’t know what dah dooze . . .
Cause we got,
Cause we got . . . those May fever
Day fever. What you say fever?
Hay fever bah-looze.

Hey . . . Where you go’n with that box of tissue?
I may be your woman, but it ain’t all about that.
You come back here, now. You here me?

Now what I am I gonna dooze?
With these . . . with these. . .
Hay fever blues.

We're talk’n some serious ah-chooze here, baby! 

 

copyright jeanne rené 2004 

Thoughts of a Mother Weeping in Our Distance

by jeanne rené

photo jeanne rené

Monotonous rows walked.
Stench rising to shields of handkerchief,
she searches for the smell of perfumed soap
on his ash covered neck

I inhale, in gasps, the disbelief of a mother.

Plastic shrouds suggest dignity
to babies of a newborn holocaust,
forfeited in a combustion of hate.
Why?
Why this sight surreal taped to her scrapbook?
A woman searches with photographs enshrined
of eyes and lips kissed with love.

I know her.
I see with the eyes of a mother.

I walk in cosmic footsteps to her door,
beating my chest with the depths of her despair.
She will
make me deaf to explanations,
and let me hear only the pitch her wail.

Mother,
I place my hands beneath your child’s head,
and stay for an eternity
that never this sleeping face touch the barren earth.

Mother,
I take my cup to catch your thousand tears
and drink them for my morning tea
that I may suffer the taste of your bitterness.

I reason with the thoughts of a mother.
She dreams,
She lives from this day
always on the portal between life and death.
She is, as lost to this world,
as her child taken.
The hint of her child’s laughter,
the slight suggestion of a smile,
a perfect profile on a Sunday afternoon . . .
and she wanders in the shadows.

I pray in her name . . .
Witness her questions frozen for posterity
as she walks the line between rows of disbelief.
How do we not share
this mother’s world
in which love and hate are indefinable?

jeanne rené  9/04

upon the axis of perfection & to give (two poems)

by jeanne rené  

~upon the axis of perfection 

the sun rose
rivers fell into the oceans
oceans fed the heavens
and on our day
before this day . . .

Her
Times tossed out of rhyme
Sight defined ~
The blitz around the corner,
Upright pedal rush.
Speed bump curb into the driveway
Wheels dumped in crash abandon
Five-steps in a two-step sprint to the front door.

Vibrations radiate~
The marathon up the stairs,
Jumbled sensations of enthusiasm.
Baying forever feedback,
Manic
mad
unmelodious beat.

Cold stepping out
From refrigerator door open,
Banging.
Winged kiss on the cheek,
Spoiled
Devil-eyed wink
"Hi mom."

Time
Passages
Life
Toss of the dice
Visions undermined~
The cold shuffling down
The body torn.
Life pools a red halo
Conquering the weightless dust .
"I’m cold. . . so cold . . ."
Winged kiss on the wind
I love you, mom.

I love you, mom,
Carried home.
Spoils of war
In her womb.

She shakes . . . dreams tossed
Out of time. Out of life.
A hand wakes her sleep.
". . . It's time to go."

and with
this day new
rivers fall into the oceans
oceans feed the heavens
and the sun will set . . . .

the sun rises

the sun sets
Our sons die 

Daughters die
With our rising.


Copyright jeanne rené  

 *****************************************

To Give

They give their lives at nineteen . . . twenty.
Give their lives in years which do not hold the measure of evolution,
Lives that fly the course of intimacy with a definitive breath.
They give
    years whose run will no longer chase a callow heart,
    till that heart finds again a promised path.

To have
none but these unpolished days.
    Faithful silence,
    hold time before their sealed lids,
    the measure of what road laid ahead before this hour.

arms wrap around
a chest pounds
trickle of water over lips
     High sun blinds as he’s tossed into the air.
     Wiggling,
     laughing too loud
     he lands in his father’s hands.
     One more time Daddy. . . One more time.
sands sift through fingers

Give
Your tears.

Give
A prayer of evolution.


copyright jeanne rené  

... to touch his fingertip

 by jeanne rené

When
   in this forever
   in this perpetual thought
   did Your monologue
   cease to fulfill its purpose
So then
   awakening Your desire
   and setting forth
   this
   our dialogue into play

Understand me
   my inquisition seeks
   the lore
   of Your impenetrable universe
   to cease the divide
   to consecrate our legacy
   to lay my fingertip at last upon Yours

Where
   is it
   that You
   lay claim to Your heritage
My bidding
   peers into the formless
   to reveal Your form
   to trace the galactic molecule
   impregnated by the unanswerable

Understand me
What
   purpose thus
   issued from
   our birthright
Was
   companionship
   or artistry Your intention
   could you not mold
   one without the other

Understand me
Why
   so exquisitely you spun
   Your wonderings
   sealing perfection
   in Your heaven and earth
And we
   Your children
   of bone and brain
   divided and departed
   from our earth's ocean
   formed in a plentitude of kinds
   and given Your breath
   first crawled upon our bellies
And why so ... we
   birthing and rebirthing
   in quest of the perfection
   bequeathed Your sun and moon
   but not our blood
   remain blemished

And understand me
When ... I ask
   are we
   those who You stood upright
When
   are we
   those who harnessed Your fire
When
   are we
   those who heard You whisper "I am"
We
   who have learned to love
   who have learned to hate
   who live but to die
We who seek
I who question
When
   will we
   will I lay my fingertip to Yours

copyright jeanne rené

Korean Poet Yoon Dong-ju

[ASMR] Counting the Stars at Night-Yun Dong Ju (별 헤는 밤-윤동주)

  

 

Forward

Wishing not to have

so much as a speck of shame

toward heaven until the day I die,

I suffered, even when the wind stirred the leaves.

With my heart singing to the stars,

I shall love all things that are dying.

And I must walk the road

that has been given to me.

Tonight, again, the stars are

brushed by the wind

November 20, 1941

 

 

Life and Poetry of the Eternal Young Poet, Yoon Dongju 

... at the gate once again. Two Poems ... "A Dead Drop to Hell" & "... to see what comes"

 Reflections on June 21, 2025 ... by jeanne rene 

 

Julien Bryan/WWII Photographer/invasion of Poland 

 

A Dead Drop to Hell  

Lest we forget.
The sum
of our conceit,
encased in fear, suckled on greed
delivered by decree.
A dead drop to hell.

For the name
of each man, woman, child,
flesh to a cinder
from one flicker
of the flame.

For the beast
who dines
on the maggots.
A dead drop to hell. 
  
For the land left
with no seed.

For the city
erased.

For the sons
and the daughters
left living,
bound by the sins of the fathers
I beg we shamefully bow.

Let us be humbled.
For we have harnessed,
understood
but a blink
of the truth …

And within our arrogance,
in our failure
to embrace a brother,
we package our gifts
for destruction,
attempting to reinvent
His law with a dead drop to hell.

I beseech thee,
Lest we forget,
the price paid
for our vanity.                         

 

******** ********

 

... to see what comes  

A child
squats in the ash
listlessly fingering circles
Watching

Balancing on toes
dug into the dust

Circle over circle
Circle over circle
Circle
Over … Over …

Watching
his fathers falter
among the ruins
Beseeching the deaf stones for hope
Balancing on toes …

Circle over circle
She sees
her brothers
drowning in manhood
to devour the fathers’ rage.
Brothers vomiting stones heavenward.

Circle over circle
she watches.
Silence watches.
Watching
the mothers’ shadow
unflinching
cast over her shoulders
numb to its woe
Balancing on toes
lost in the dust …

And the wind exhales
casting the earth into eyes of the child
blinded by shields of furious locks
 … and he stays, she stays 
Unflinching 

Toes digging into the unforgiving
They stay.
Circling in the rain.
They stay.

The children stay to see what comes.

until ... somewhere in country

 by jeanne rené  

 Dad in the middle of both photos ...

when i was seventeen my boy friends went off to war
i wrote letters and sent rosary beads from the holy land

they sent me stiff,  thin-lipped boot camp pictures
and later colored photos of ageless young men
grinning in front of a camera, arms over shoulders, tugging each other
posing for a group shot

while somewhere in country …

still, war was far from my reality
the children of war far, far from my comprehension
except for words scribbled and deposited
into the mail box with the red flag
from boy friends who continued to write

at home
i went to university but i did not march
and i did not wear black arm bands
perhaps because rudy asked me to keep
his track medals and 45’s

until

he came back

but, maybe i did not march
because my father had written letters to
girlfriends and his mother twenty-seven years earlier

while somewhere in country …

and, he shared with his daughter albums of ageless young men
smiling at the camera, arms over shoulders
pulling each other into a group shot

my boy friends all came home
i asked rudy for a boonie hat
which he never gave me
and he told me to keep his medals and 45’s

it was a yellow box
where the letters kept for many years
never re-read
until
i threw each one away
seventeen was a long, long time ago
these men were far, far from my reality

until

my husband hugs our son
who left
for somewhere in country …

i looked
at this ageless old man
as he sat down and reclined the lazy boy
staring at an awkward boot camp picture on our living room wall
i understood somewhere ever present in his reality
he stands in front of the camera, some buddy’s arm over his shoulder
dragging him into a group shot

and i …
i took out a pencil and some paper
 

Copyright jeanne rené  3.2014

 Marty saying goodbye to Johnny ... joking ... making the best of the moment ...

Fabulous Frogs

by jeanne rené 

 ... some memories on this Mother's Day

I miss

fabulous frogs

held up under my nose

to my cross-eyed astonishment,

 

. . .  the snail parade on the patio steps,

and my disappearing pots and pans,

to brew the scrumptious dirt stew.

 

I miss

looking out the kitchen window,

watching the wind flapping the corners

of the old bedspread tent,

 

. . . the sound

of the bat hitting the cement ,

and new jeans with holes in the knees

from sliding into first base.

 

I miss

action figures with one arm,

shoe boxes of matchstick cars,

kissing puppy giggles,

chasing extraordinary pigeons,

and  cries “I can’t get down from the tree!”

 

If I turn my hourglass over

can each grain of sand be etched

with the past . . .

 

I miss

two sleepy heads

bobbing in the back seat,

pulling up in the driveway late at night,

and gently disturbing their dreams,

 

. . . giving a kiss on each sticky forehead,

and turning off the lights with a prayer on my lips.

 

jeanne rené  10/04