Cindy Rinne
Sea Ice
After “Life in the Poles: Waiting for the Ice to Break Up” by Christopher Ulivo
Sand and rocks sink
beneath their feet,
a silence only the sea
can understand.
Snow islands
speak in code
of knocking bones
against sediment cliffs.
Did they dare
venture out in their
small, wooden boat--
the sail in tatters?
Paleoindian child
climbs into the boat,
watches the sea
split into puzzle pieces.
Ocean black
cracks and breaks.
Her burnt bones hold
a handle covered
in seal skin.
She strikes
the driftwood rim
of caribou skin
drum and sings an ayaya,
Spring sun, come soon
Sail away
under first full moon.
The woman sings--
Bloom fireweed,
Monkshood, Larkspur,
Arctic lupine from seed.
Biting wind
capsizes the fishing boat,
once a place of cast gillnets,
haunted salmon.
Touch the Sun
The Feather Keeper scraped
His way
Onto raven’s head.
Protected by The White Buffalo Woman’s
Feather from the brilliance
Of the sun,
The Feather Keeper recalled
Owl magic sealing
His skin
And hawk chick
Proclaiming him
Light as a newborn.
He held the sun in his outstretched arms.
Cindy Rinne is an experimental storyteller and record-keeper of many cultures. Cindy creates art and writes in San Bernardino, CA. She is an author with Michael Thomas Cooper of Speaking Through Sediment (forthcoming). Cindy is a founding member of PoetrIE. Her work appeared or is forthcoming in The MOON Magazine, Dual Coast Magazine, Artemis Journal, Meat for Tea: The Valley Review, Pirene’s Fountain, The Poetry Bus (Ireland), The Wayfarer, Extinguished, Extinct Anthology by Twelve Winters Press, The Lake (England), Revolution House, Soundings Review, The Gap Toothed Madness, Poetry Quarterly, The Prose-Poem Project, and others. Follow her at: www.fiberverse.com
Sea Ice
After “Life in the Poles: Waiting for the Ice to Break Up” by Christopher Ulivo
Sand and rocks sink
beneath their feet,
a silence only the sea
can understand.
Snow islands
speak in code
of knocking bones
against sediment cliffs.
Did they dare
venture out in their
small, wooden boat--
the sail in tatters?
Paleoindian child
climbs into the boat,
watches the sea
split into puzzle pieces.
Ocean black
cracks and breaks.
Her burnt bones hold
a handle covered
in seal skin.
She strikes
the driftwood rim
of caribou skin
drum and sings an ayaya,
Spring sun, come soon
Sail away
under first full moon.
The woman sings--
Bloom fireweed,
Monkshood, Larkspur,
Arctic lupine from seed.
Biting wind
capsizes the fishing boat,
once a place of cast gillnets,
haunted salmon.
Touch the Sun
The Feather Keeper scraped
His way
Onto raven’s head.
Protected by The White Buffalo Woman’s
Feather from the brilliance
Of the sun,
The Feather Keeper recalled
Owl magic sealing
His skin
And hawk chick
Proclaiming him
Light as a newborn.
He held the sun in his outstretched arms.
Cindy Rinne is an experimental storyteller and record-keeper of many cultures. Cindy creates art and writes in San Bernardino, CA. She is an author with Michael Thomas Cooper of Speaking Through Sediment (forthcoming). Cindy is a founding member of PoetrIE. Her work appeared or is forthcoming in The MOON Magazine, Dual Coast Magazine, Artemis Journal, Meat for Tea: The Valley Review, Pirene’s Fountain, The Poetry Bus (Ireland), The Wayfarer, Extinguished, Extinct Anthology by Twelve Winters Press, The Lake (England), Revolution House, Soundings Review, The Gap Toothed Madness, Poetry Quarterly, The Prose-Poem Project, and others. Follow her at: www.fiberverse.com