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[with 3 poems by Sandra Dreis]
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The Vestibule
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I fear the snake plant
crouching on the coffee table,
crackled celadon planter
a get-well gift for Grandma
Gertie from distant cousin Fay.
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It arrived yesterday, cat-beast
with bulging eyes that will prowl
room to room while Grandma,
small and fragile in her big chair,
sleeps. Stark plant, no leaves,
only sharp swords unsheathed.
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I stall. Linger in light, the sunny
vestibule my barrier island,
face pressed into lace curtains
stretched tight over glass double doors.
I’m six. Safe. Separate from the mainland
of scary things. Cancer.
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My blond frizz catches elastic, necklace
strung last summer from odd seashells
as we hummed together in the kitchen.
How Grandma dipped the fountain pen’s
gold tip in a bottle of dark blue ink,
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etching columns in a heavy ledger,
numbers and letter so curly and pretty,
scratch-scratch-blot-blot-blot,
her easy script clear as the crystal
doorknob I dare not turn.
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Sandra Brodkin Dreis
from Cultured Pearls, Kelsay Books, American Fork, UT; © 2024
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How safe is safe enough, and how safe too safe? Third day of backpacking, Mike and I arrive at a clearing and scout for a good tent site. Not too much slope, head higher than heels, no roots or stones, at least none too big. Ah, here it is, the perfect spot. Per our usual routine we lie down in the leaves to test the lay, and then Mike looks up. Nope. Thirty feet above our heads is a dead branch big around as your thigh. If that thing cracks free in a midnight gust, our wives will be cashing in the policies. Find a different site.
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Fifteen years later Linda is still not a widow and I should be grateful that she seems to intend to keep it that way for a while yet. Last Thursday I was hoping to hike up the Mountains-to-Sea Trail for a work day above Stone Mountain State Park, but a front moved in and lashed the house all night. The morning forecast still warned of gusts up to 35 mph. Lots of dead branches in all those trees. Did I decide to stay home for me or for Linda?
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Looking at the photos of my braver friends who did spend the day on the trail, I wish I’d gone with them. Yes, I do. Which regret is more bitter, doing the thing that gets you into a mess of trouble or not doing the thing that only might have? I suppose if a tree falls on you, your regret is swift and sharp but it isn’t going last very long (nor are you), whereas I’ve been moping for a week that I didn’t give those trees a chance to get me.
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Which just proves . . . nothing. The tree that gets me will be the one I didn’t see coming. Rue and remorse and the road not taken are great for writing a poem but not particularly useful for getting out of bed each morning. I’ll stir up a tasty stew of the past and savor it when a good meal of recollection is called for, but I’ll do my best not to choke on it.
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On the other hand, nothing is altogether sorry or useless if it reminds you occasionally to look up.
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Charles, Triple Pirouette – 1983
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They share spartan diets, actor’s nightmares,
sore feet. Meet in a Hell’s Kitchen laundry room.
He’s drying, reading a Bible, waiting.
She’s washing a basket of dance clothes
and sweats. He hands her a needed quarter.
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Turns out, she’s directing and casting
a twenty-city tour, so they chat away.
Excellent pay. He light ups, demonstrates
a triple pirouette in sneakers – on carpet.
His easy-going pizzazz, an instant hire.
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Bright-eyed even for early morning rehearsals,
he’s warmed-up and ready. During breaks, a loner,
he reads the Bible. In hotel lobbies, on plane rides.
To sassy cast members, he winks, “I’ll pray for you.”
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Performances end by Christmas, yet nobody hears
from Charles. The gossip train – Radio City nabbed him,
for sure. But his roommate calls her from St. Vincent’s.
Charles is gone. A rare pneumonia. Enough said.
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Bath towels thud, dryer drum pounds. Her face flushes
pink as she opens to door to bereft. Puff of heat.
Steam dissipates, clothes churn and settle with a sigh.
Oh, Charles.
Bible in hand, he gently spins to a stop.
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Sandra Brodkin Dreis
from Cultured Pearls, Kelsay Books, American Fork, UT; © 2024
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❦ ❦ ❦
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The three steps required to create a poetry book, perhaps in decreasing order of difficulty, are choosing which poems to include, deciding how to order and arrange them, and picking a title. None of the three are easy but creating a title is the most mysterious. Many poets cop out and just use the title of one of the poems in the collection – but how do you decide which one is THE poem? Someday soon I’m going to create a found poem using only the titles of the hundreds of poetry books lurking in every corner of my house. I think I’ll title it, “New and Selected.”
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Cultured Pearls by Sandra Brodkin Dreis – where does that title come from and what is its deeper meaning? The only reference to pearls among the poetry is spotless white sandals, silky pearl-button cardigan in Kingdom of Immaculate, which lingers with the poet’s mother in her last days of dementia. A cultured pearl is a beautiful artifact, a human effort to replicate and even improve upon nature. It is a commonplace bit of shell formed by machining into a sphere but then over the course of a year or longer within the mantle of a living mollusk layered with exquisite nacre.
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Perhaps every one of us is a cultured pearl. Throughout our lives we struggle to create the artifact of our persona, but our life itself creates the strange chemistry that makes us who we are. Inventory our insides and you get a fairly boring list: carbon, calcium, nitrogen, oxygen; sugar, protein, necklaces of nucleotide; bone, fat, gristle. But the sac which holds these elements and molecules and tissues, the mantle that continuously forms and reforms us, is wit, humor, curiosity, love.
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These poems by Sandra Dreis are indeed such a nacreous mantle. So many pearls inhabit her lines – cherished friends lost to AIDS, family members scarred by prejudice and displacement, loved ones fading and dying. She holds their luster up to us. She reminds us how they have shone. She may admit the grit and schmutz that make up the heart of persons, but she also opens the shell and reveals each one’s unique beauty. So, Sandra . . . nice title!
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Cultured Pearls is available from Kelsay Books. Sandra Dreis lives in Winston-Salem and has had a long career as dancer, educator, novelist, and poet.
Read Raven’s Beak by Sandra at this previous intallment of VERSE & IMAGE.
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Early Grey
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Mom does not remember
Earl Grey tea. That she prefers it.
That she loves it. No sugar. Just plain
No lemon. God forbid – milk.
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For all she knows, Earl Grey is a fine gentleman
riding from his castle in the English countryside,
galloping on his well-groomed steed. He halts
by the rocky brook to adjust his fine felt hat.
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Mom, at 93. My reminders, steady fuel,
stoke the furnace of her runaway locomotive.
But Mom, you love Earl Grey, your favorite!
Really? I do? Well, okay. If you say so.
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Consider young Earl – Mom’s former sixth-grader
who threatened to kill himself. New York City
Police apprehended him on the 59th St. Bridge.
That Earl, she claims, took years off her life.
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Perhaps Earl Grey – could he be an uncle?
A Jewish uncle named, Harry Grey, emigrated
as Harry Greenberg from a shtetl in Russia.
Maybe Ellis Island saw fit to shorten his name.
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The copper kettle shrieks, Mom unaware.
I pour steaming tea and fill our porcelain cups
with disbelief. Small kitchen table. We sit before
a plate of scones. Mom smiles. We steep.
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Sandra Brodkin Dreis
from Cultured Pearls, Kelsay Books, American Fork, UT; © 2024
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V E R S E and I M A G E 
Thanks Bill. Once again you stir memory with the presence of loved ones and nature.
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Thanks, Neighbor. Hope to see you soon. —B
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Wonderful choices to feature from Sandra’s excellent poetry. Her gift to share her vast and often painful experiences with such lovely language grips any reader. SB
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Thanks, Sam, and I appreciate your remarks on her back cover! —
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Lovely, sad but affirming the value of life. My layers of nacre are peeling slowly away. Love your essay. We await your “title” book.
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Les, you are lustrous. —B
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Love the poems and your comments. Dementia is a fragile state of being. A good friend from church lost his wife recently. Her last words were “you’ve been a wonderful husband.” Sadly my sister couldn’t get the words out but she was definitely aware of all of us. When we visit my brother in law now he motions to the beautiful mahogany box on a table near by. I feel a poem coming on whenever he recognizes my sister.
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Nancy, thank you for your deep perceptions. And the image of your brother-in-law communing with your sister . . . —B
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