Julie Steiner


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Palinode

Tyger Tyger, bright with flame:
sorry I misspelt thy name!
Pray forgive my other bungles:
saying “forests,” meaning “jungles”;

deeming light reflected from
thine eyes’ tapetum lucidum
actual combustion; and
flubbing, through too-slight command

of cardiology, the part
about “the sinews of thy heart.”
Thoughts of chains and anvil-bangers
made me drop some fearful clangers.

How my cheeks are burning bright!
Dare I hope I’ve set things right
by means of this regretful ditty,
Tiger Tiger? Kitty Kitty?

 

Insecurity Breach

On June 8, 2014, Paris’s famed Pont des Arts footbridge was closed for several hours, because a section of its fencing had collapsed into the Seine under the weight of thousands of “love locks.”

Oh padlock, bind
my love to me.
He’s too inclined
to truancy.
For slavery
you’re well designed,
but you can free
my fretful mind.

Oh locksmith, find
your tools, for we
were mis-entwined.
Disharmony,
eternally?
Oh, I was blind!
But you can free
my fretful mind.

Oh river, grind!
Oh gravity,
destroy! Be kind
and serve as key!
Oh entropy,
you’re much maligned,
but you can free
my fretful mind.

My heart can’t be
un-valentined,
but you can free
my fretful mind.

A longtime participant of Eratosphere (Able Muse’s online poetry workshop), Julie Steiner is also a member of the international task force to preserve and promote the late British poet M. A. Griffiths’ literary legacy. More details at http://ramblingrose.com/grasshopper/ . Julie lives in San Diego, California.