Dear Georgia
I’ve been absolutely terrified every moment
of my life, and I’ve never let it keep me
from a single thing that I’ve wanted to do.
—Georgia O’Keeffe
Such intense summer heat in Baltimore
conjures your Southwest desert scenes—
spacious places you called the faraway.
I recollect a surfeit of skulls, pelvis bones,
the ghostly Pedernal mesa rising
toward a painted blue canvas sky.
Your lined face a landscape
showing traces of what you survived:
typhoid fever, depression, failing sight.
Shards of sun and grief, yet
you gave everything to art. Your Red
Poppy, Purple Petunias, Black Iris
mesmerize museum walls. Oh, Georgia—
fearless, flowering and finally free
in that Ford Model A coupe you bought
and learned to drive in your 40’s.
A vehicle for transformation. How
far away did it carry you?
After 98 years on earth, you press your foot
to the pedal, leave us
awash in your prismatic dust.
Snow on Lilacs
April 20, 2021
for George Floyd (1973-2020)
Snow coats April lilacs
after a blast of Arctic air. Winter
refuses to leave without disfiguring Spring.
My sweater offers a light shield
I’d gladly share with the blooms. We shiver
in unison, these purple heartthrobs and me.
Today, a jury finds a white policeman
guilty of killing a Black citizen
he swore to protect. The new felon
shivers inside a jail cell.
Within prison walls,
an absence of flowers.
A little girl leaves a bouquet of violets
near the spot where her father breathed his last—
face down, his pleas melting into pavement.
What should I title this poem?
How long will it take
for the snow on the lilacs to melt?
Shirley J. Brewer (Baltimore MD) serves as poet-in-residence at Carver Center for the Arts, and on the board of directors of Passager Books. Her poems garnish Barrow Street, Passager, Gargoyle, Poetry East, Loch Raven Review, among other journals and anthologies. Shirley’s poetry books include A Little Breast Music (Passager Books), After Words (Apprentice House Press), Bistro in Another Realm (Main Street Rag), and Wild Girls (Apprentice House Press).
Website: shirleyjbrewer.com
Interviewed in January, 2020 by Maryland poet laureate, Grace Cavalieri, for her series “The Poet and the Poem” at the Library of Congress, Shirley’s poems are part of the Lunar Codex program and are currently on the moon!