Woman by Albert Huffstickler

I feel like I've been going non-stop for the last 4 months, so I'm calling on an old friend to bail we out today: Albert Huffstickler.   Sure, Albert's been gone almost 10 years - how can it be - yet still, all the time, it seems almost everyday, he comes along and he helps me out.  Sometimes, it's with little things - a smile and a nod and off.

Other times, it's bigger things.  Huff knew how to tackle those.  Take it apart, piece by piece - one little thing at a time.

A couple of weeks ago, another longtime poet and friend, T. Kilgore Splake, sent along some of Huff's poems he ran across. He knew, or sensed, that was just the thing for me. Settling down with those was very helpful, it had a calming effect - like talking to an old friend on the phone.  Yeah, it's long distance, but that's a tab I'll pick up any day.

So, I thought I'd share one of them with you.  Here goes:

   Woman

If stone could be soft
and retain its softness,
you'd be stone.
There is, in your sadness,
the fatedness of stone.
As stone would be stone
and nothing else,
so you are soft and
nothing will sway or
bend or change that softness.
It is a stone softness,
knowing itself, as stone
knows itself, to be
this way and no other.
This is your truth
and how you must be known-
as that which is soft
and at the same time stone.

     Albert Huffstickler

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This week's featured poem is from Lilliput Review,  #152, a beautiful little poem by Martin Grantham.

   Sierra Azul

Here, when I look up, are mountains,
the elegant curve of their backs
draped in life's dark blue cloak.
So much unchanging in our tiny time
goes unattended, but as I move,
these mountains move with me.

              Martin Grantham

for our sake enduring
the winter rain...
stone Buddha

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,
Don

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