Central California Poetry Journal

Volume 99 Number 1

The Poetry of Central California Page 9102

The Poetry of Sandy Starr

Sandy Starr is a journalist, writer/photographer for a newspaper and business publications. She currently resides in the mountains outside of Albuquerque, New Mexico. She makes an annual pilgrimage to California. She has written poetry for as long as she can remember. She has been published locally in several publications, and in InkLit and Artisan. Starr has lived all over the country and the world. Her heart however still lives in San Francisco, where she lived for two years in the 1970's. She says that she loves the California coast, and that her favorite thing to do is drive up Highway 1 and take it all in," the view, the smell, everything." Starr wrote the poems in this collection about California. Sandy Starr's poetry was also featured on page 7107 of the 1997 edition of the Central California Poetry Journal in 1997.

My Traveler's Heart

I came to California naive,
a wanderer, a gypsy taken and tossed from coast to coast
and points in between,
having racked up road miles and
memories and lost friends and roots and home--
I came reluctant and fighting the unknown.
San Francisco seemed a scary place
to one who had traveled, yet not seen
the likes of a city full of such rich vivid life.
I fought, but soon let go of weapons,
dropping them like pebbles and shells onto a beach,
feeling them and resistance washed away by waves
and light and madness as the City worked its magic.
Too little time. Too little time.
Two years of learning, soaking up and, taking in,
storing up, and I left fighting, resisting the leaving more
than the coming.
Two decades have rolled by like the miles on all those
highways , with only one trip back. An infusion.
A transfusion. A rebirth into beauty. Bedazzled again
by the light and water and air. Energized by crazy dashes up and down
and up those hills, my laughter bounced off the stuccoed walls
of ice cream houses, bouncing back into my head, against my skin.
In the far off desert now, I reach back
to memory for inspiration. In my deepest sleep, in my fondest dreams
I sing Tony's song.

Drivers Ed

Today I am cursing every vehicle that moves
and especially the ones that don't.
Damned traffic. Idiot!! Just because you put on your blinker
doesn't mean you can go!
I am tired. And achey. The withering of stamina starting
before today's flu shot that makes my arm hot to the touch.
My brain feels frazzled. I think it would be hot to the touch too,
like wires exposed to water. Buzzzzz.

Grating, grated. Grumpy and bitchy.
Barging through the day, hurling myself through the streets,
trying to get home without running someone down
just because they're there and being
stupid.
My son the student sits next to me.
He watches. He listens. He pipes in a time or two
with his own expletives, but
he hears with a son's heart,
says
Mom, you need a beach fix.
Smart kid, this student.
We fantasize like we used to when
he was little, when he would sit
on his knees in the drivers seat,
small hands grasping the wheel.
"Where do you want to go, Mama?"
And we would make up places. I would say,
drive me to the ocean.
Off we'd go.

Today, sitting in the passenger seat,
head towering above me, nearly touching
the roof of the car, he asks which beach
would be good this time of year?
I say California beaches. I need the soothing of
that wild coast.
Drive me up Highway 1, son.
Let's just take this car and go.
Some things don't take institutions
to be learned.
History isn't always
ancient.

Seasons Change, Sea Beckons

A tinge of something changing paints the early morning air,
a bite of crispness and wedge of coolness
flits across my bare feet as quickly as a butterfly--
but I know it is coming.
A stir deep in the belly begins. A low current of excitement.
Even though summer's leaving is mourned for all it had
and more for what it failed to contain,
the change to fall and the coming of winter
rides a precarious crest of a wild wave.
I feel the changes somewhere in my soul and know
that I am reaching toward them now, not running away.
But the change I need most eludes me.
It is too far away to touch. Distance keeps fulfillment far across
parched landscapes, black lava rock, arid moonscapes of deserts
once covered with water, once littered with sea creatures.
In my dreams it rolls in and washes me clean, soothes
my spirit, soaks me through like a dry sponge thrown into
a vast ocean.
What I need, what I crave, is excitement and change, what I eat
and sleep and dream and bleed is the change from desert dry
to ocean wet. I can love the change of season, the color bursting forth,
the smoky scent of night and wood smoke.
But I can live well once I have touched again
the shore, walked shoeless on sharp rocks,
stood with arms open and embracing the Pacific wind.
I can go on once I have bathed my feet in cold fizz, and breathed the scent
of all beginning.

Wanting the ocean

This is my vacation for now as
the newness becomes familiar.
This building with the tin roof
gravel yard ,
hard unyielding earth in back,
necessitates spending summer
in a different space, but
in limbo.

It's ok,
the understanding is there.
Money money money, the root of all
and the lack of which paints the current scenario.
I know
and understand,
but my feet are so hot you see.
They sizzle on the hot rocks,
sting on goatheads rising from barren sand.
They tingle with heat even on the new cool tile,
and yearn,
if feet can yearn,
for waves,
for a bathing the way Jesus bathed feet,
simple yet soothing,
foam lacking suds
but bursting with fizz--
foam wrapping cracked skin longing for healing.
My feet yearn for remembered sand
damp, cool,
caressing, the feeling a
rejuvenation of sole
and soul.
The mind can hold qualification,
condition, limits, rationalization--
the heart is linked to the body, and can know no fences.
Boundaries mean
nothing as the pulse aligns with waves
beating onto shore.

Tide Pulls

Wind has howled for weeks,
sucking scant moisture from all living things,
bending them to its will.
Grass hangs on, but the grip grows weak
Birds rejoice as fountains are filled
from a long green, spouting snake.
Even skin feels brittle, scale-like.
No supple, moist texture can be found here.
Heat heats up. Summer moves in, bawdy,
hot and mean.
Encapsulated in memory, mist comes into dreams.
Waves fling wild those precious drops of foam.
The desert cooks but sends lies, undulating waves
rise from baking, melting asphalt.
Memory survives, sustains. Ocean is out there.
Tide pulls. Tide pools beckon.

Peas and Luck

Yesterday,
the first day of a new year
I slipped up,
didn't eat the damned blackeyed peas,
and I have worried all day
that a gray cloud is forming somewhere
waiting--
gathering particles to darken itself
before its programmed roll across my horizon
where it will dump a deluge of bad luck
on top of me.
Its just a tradition,
just a custom.
Its a thing we do because
someone did it and someone before them
and it took hold and took on a life of its own.
Do I not have enough
worry about?
Enough sleepless hours?
But what if I was, say,
Chinese?
They don't even have the same years we do.
So who says I am on the list for bad luck
because I ate the pork on New Years day
but forgot to eat even a spoonful of those damned blackeyed peas?

Long Dry

A long dry winter has reached its point of
near departure
leaving spring on the wind,
just a hint and a smell, a promise.
But the dust obscures on windy days.
coats and chokes and weights down
the hill and gulley and heart
longing for rain.

Crisp hillsides coated with yellowed brittle grasses
seem lifeless
lie dormant
waiting for a storm to roll in and bathe
annoint
revive.
Winds whip and ripple the dry grass-
make it wave
and shudder
as if a seed of worry has been planted
and started to sprout then spread.
A worry in the breezes--
long dry can bring fire to the hill sides
long dry can bring longing to the soul.
Roll in storm,
come off the ocean.
Roll in with moisture heavy clouds
drooping, sagging with wet
Memory lingers laden with hope.
Roll in.
pour down
and like a wave washing far up the beach
at high tide
drench the hillsides
fill the streams
soak my parched
and withered soul.

Weather Report for Big Sur

Wet and cold out,
I am huddled under soft covers in,
grateful for the tin roof overhead
that lets snow slide off of in sheets
making a whish-thump,
startling the cat
sending him bushy tailed
running.

TV weatherman mentions the next storm
rolling in wet
off the Pacific.
It will come this way in a day or two,
but for now he says
rain with heavy surf
will reach down the coast
all the way to Big Sur.

I sigh, go snow blind,
feel the sting of salt spray
enter the memory,
see the scene where I stood once
soaking up a sun setting
red and gold in its glory
before dropping
into the rhythm of the sea
leaving shimmers of color
to fade away
into the chilly pine scented night.

I feel the blankets again and gulp for air
as I come back from a long mind trip,
see again the snowflakes,
hold on to remnants of memory
hot chocolate
soul food
Big Sur.

Redwood City in the Distance of Mind

Evening hangs on the fringe of daylight
and the sun bursts from behind heat clouds.
Sunset, and the light bounces,
the hills have golden eyes
set in square boxes
as house upon house reflects back the brightness.

Sun sets
in the west but reflects back
against my eyes from eastern rocky foothills
bathes my face in orange gold hues
lights my mind with fantasy

Sun sets in the desert
as tonight I dream of the Pacific Coast
and the ball of fire dropping into that vast
rolling sea
dream
of a city where possibilities could lie
or not
but a dream took flight with the bumblebee
the size of a hummingbird
that left a dripping petunia basket
with a buzz and a lift into the gathering dusk.
Sunset glimmers off a wing,
the bee flies homeward.

A quiet settles,
dreams fly west
headed for the edge of the world
where a ball of fire will grow large
and tease those seeking
horizons
before dropping away behind the ocean
just out of reach of longing.