Blog Archives - Heather Lee Rogers: Poetry

Cafe Poem, for Rashida

1/31/2015

Remember us
all starry-eyed
when this café
was magic cool
me, you, and your
new classmates
one order of fries
and many coffees
surrounded by
blues musicians
film directors
foreign millionaires
            the alcoholic writer
            scribbling at his table
            all alone, my god,
the west village
wasn’t ohio
wasn’t high school
we talked big, giggled,
wondered if the
european accents
were even real
but we were artists
living in New York
we had arrived.

Back from Puerto Rico, Two New Poems!

1/27/2015

My friend and I just took a short vacation in Puerto Rico to celebrate our birthdays. It was amazing, beautiful, inspiring...

Isla Verde Lessons (for Amy)

When the fresh rain was cool
and the salt ocean warm
when my body floated between
learning the dance of drops
like glass marbles bouncing
across gray waves
when I swam in the music
of wise old men
the strokes of a salsa
the rain of a drumbeat that
lulls in a groove on a dream
when our new friend
the double rainbow
taught us to breath
deep in the forest
to keep running
back into the rain.

La Placita, San Juan

In their rum sweet sunset
the salsa men of the plaza
blow wisdom through horns
trace lives over strings
chew lemons slowly
pull souls from worn throats
out into the night

In their spice sweet sunset
the salsa women of the plaza
school birth and death
with the toss of a head
spin lovers real and dreamed
stomp out the workday hours
with strong feet
each limb offering
a mystery and a home

These men and women
steeped in their sunsets
like a good strong tea
these are the stars of the plaza
each body singing in holy duet
with the moon.

Blue, Like the Sea

1/21/2015

Blue

you see me floating
away from you

you know
you know me raw and inside out
you know you’re losing me.

the tide is pulling
the sand from my feet
I go out deeper, I tread water
pretending
I am not the wave
to pound you to the rocks.

my eyes
the ones you thought were grey at first
so many lives ago
my eyes are Blue, dear,
like the sea
and all my sins and shames
are floating clear
they tell on me a thousand times a day

but you know me
safer not to swim in them
but kiss my neck
and smell my salty hair
like it’s something
you’ll want to remember.

Thrilled this poem got published in Adelaide Lit Journal, May 2018!

Barn Dance Lust Poem

1/18/2015

All overgrown
for lack of plowing
I dream too loudly
waiting to be picked
I am, of course, late
to the barn dance
the farmers
are busy increasing their flocks
the cowboys
have chosen wild mares
they will tame
the fiddler stirs and stomps
the music seizes me
I shake, I kick, I scream
O music in my stomach
music music in my hair
blood rises to hot cheeks
a sweating dance
a full ripe dance
I am a feast
and miss the good boys
gliding home good girls
by plump pink arms
the band has packed their magic up
but I don’t hear them anymore
I’ve claimed the center
of the barn’s dirt floor
my dress split open
I am spinning
faster faster faster
all alone.

(published June 16, 2016 in the Rat's Ass Review's Love and Ensuing Madness section!)

Moving Day

1/15/2015

Gasped “Yes”
when my alarm went off
like my heart
at last
exhaled

then your coffee mug
unraveled me
an undone mess
I couldn’t meet your eyes
across our kitchen table
for the last time

so out the window
a yellow leaf
clung all alone to
a December tree
I remembered
the first poem I wrote
another one-leaf-poem
before you happened
before we became
the leaver and the lost

then a big thick flock
of strong black birds
carved one way
then the other
changing their path
in the cold grey sky.

* This poem was published on the Rat's Ass Review's Love and Ensuing Madness section on 3/5/16!
http://ratsassreview.net/?page_id=1070

World-Hopping

1/12/2015

Last week here in NYC it was very cold and I was very busy acting-wise. On Saturday the week's work culminated in a rehearsal and then a performance of one play in Queens followed by a rehearsal and then a performance of a totally different play in Brooklyn. So, new poem!

World-Hopping

World-Hopping
down the icy streets
from heart-ache alley
to slapstick silly
stuffing myself
with more words
skipping dinner
wrapping and unwrapping
the tundra layers
the costume pieces
there is music to remember
and All The Right Things
in my big blue bag
dream, inhale, speak
see your breath
tears for the beauty
giggles for the mischief
and the mistakes that
float by like skaters
let them glide by or you fall
keep spinning the stories
jump the lucky sleigh
with the master pretenders
they fold you in a blanket
on a night like this
let no one drink
the frost alone
keep on moving
till you’ve earned
your sweet sleep.

Greenhouse Dream

1/9/2015

a poem about wanting to get warm on a cold day...

Greenhouse Dream

Drawing myself
up up up up
the frigid island Manhattan
up to your warm cocoon
up to your small dark room
to beg your soft fingers
to shed off my everyday
down to just skin, just hair
my body ripening
with the heat of my wanting
radiators hissing and steaming
a greenhouse dream
you grow tall like a jungle vine
I climb you to dizziness
I open, I bloom for you
we are all wide and hungry
we satiate, we salivate
we throb entwined
while the November wind
lashes outside in its fury.

Carnival Poem

1/5/2015

An old one I consider sort of a signature poem, this can be found in my chapbook...

Carnival Poem

The carnival came on Post, on the Base
after school
after dark
when the lights on the rides
made circles in the sky
as they spun spun spun
we screamed
flew high, rushed fast
swung wide
shooting balloons
water pistol clowns
playing skeeball
playing pretty girls
lip gloss and eye
shadows
of the full full moon
of the wet fall leaves
cotton candy
snowcones, popcorn
loud rock and roll
the heavy old voices
calling up ghosts
“Step Right Up”
to the tilt-a-whirl
to the scrambler
rollercoaster, rocket ship tip
“Who will dare?”
I would dare
the girls chewed gum
fixed their hair
walking standing walking
boring
looking for ‘him’
being seen by ‘them’
scenicly be-seen scenery
I wanted action
to soar high, fly
spin faster
get dizzier
break open the sky
to rock and jerk
through the crisp night air
with the world so small
from the tipppity tip top
of the ferris wheeeeel
the wizened old men
winked and slurred
when they belted me in
padded cars smelled like
old roller skates
“you got pretty eyes honey”
and dropped theirs
“Whatsyername?”
the quarterback gave Betsy his letter jacket
the air hung bright
with sex and smoke
the women sneered
at the high school
scene seen it all
for centuries
withered, tattooed
swearing and wise
bad teeth cackling
I wanted to join them
a wild gypsy queen
travelling in trucks
selling youth potions and lies
or crank slugging
space ships off to the moon
rabbits feet and feathered roach clips
I wanted to
feed big snakes
drink, smoke, fuck, laugh
a gear-greased, sawdusted
Madam
of the weird night world.

Granny

1/4/2015

It's my grandmother's 97th birthday. She was a professional artist/painter, also a poet and a life-long hell-raiser who had lived multiple lives on three continents (and visited five). We were very close, soul-mates, best friends. She has been suffering from dementia (and some other physical ailments) for about a decade. Witnessing and grappling with this transformation from who she was to who she is now has been profound for me and I write about her all the time. So here are three poems about my Granny. (The first two can be found in my chapbook!)

This first one was written before she went into an assisted living home (maybe 8 years ago?) and I worried about her safety all the time. It is inspired by a poem we read together called Burnings by her friend Jeffery Beam (who is an awesome poet!)

Fire Poem

Don’t mind a bonfire of my words
while in silence
I watch my favorite person die.
Don’t mind a bonfire of my words
when polite conversation cannot describe this.
Don’t mind a bonfire of my words
when the end should be swift
as the stroke of a match
and not a lingering smoke
suffocating slowly
as indignities stack
and independence
smolders away
in the ash of the skin
that no longer heals.
Don’t mind a bonfire of my words
when I tell you her life
was a blaze
a storm of exotic fireworks
a happy birthday candle
a wild ember glittering
in the African bush
untamed.
Don’t mind a bonfire of my words
when her loneliness
bubbles like volcanoes
when frustration
blisters her palms
and I am a useless 600 miles away -
Don’t mind a bonfire of my words
when there is nothing I can say
and all I’ve got
is the waiting
and the love
and the fire
fire
fire
fire
fire.

This second poem was written around the same time, maybe on the same visit.

Short Poem

You say you’re
short of breath
I hear it
shallow clipping
in your slender chest
“I’m afraid
I’m feeling my age
now for the first time”
you say again.
We read short poems.
You say you like mine better.
Plane tickets are an act of faith
and love
Oh Granny,
short of breath!

This last one I wrote a year ago, visiting her in the assisted living home where (on a good day) she knows I'm a Heather and that a Heather is a good thing but not that I'm her grandaughter or that I live in New York or really much of anything that's going on around her.

Prism Poem

Visiting granny
through prisms of poetry
cut by shards
of darkness and light
in shadows
a feral retreat
a whispered decline
then all is bright
the glint of a smile
I remember, adore
we shimmer
two hearts break
so gently we can only
dance
in love
in pain
in memories
dancing together
to time signatures
at once too slow
and much too fast.

Sunlight Poem

1/2/2015

So much light
flooding my morning
in this joyful pushy sunlight
it seems strange but
I don’t really miss you
it’s true
a plush monkey
blinks back at me
near a glove-and-pipe-cleaner
dragonfly
prop remnants of my crazy blast
performing
in that packed full basement
the night before…
Yes, I was out having fun without you.
Well, you would have skipped it anyway
even before
because you don’t do
brooklyn
or midnight
or fun
so much light
the sun rises and circles
I danced with it, you see
and clipped it to my curtain
there was a tiger too
bear witness baby
this is what I do
so many blessings
so rich in friends
and life goes on
yes, even without you.

Heather Lee Rogers

I write and perform poetry. I have been published on many websites and print publications at various times throughout my life. I live in NYC where I also create as an actor. Acting makes me forget that I'm a poet for long stretches of time. But I mean to work on that here: I'll be posting old poems, new poems, and everything in between. Thanks for visiting. Enjoy!

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