My poems are mincing, prissy things
With hands enclosed in cotton gloves,
No shrieks of pain, no turgid loins,
No trembling roses, or old loves.
My poems are too polite to speak
Of romance or of raging wrath
And, Quakerish, they walk upon
The plain and simple Friendly path.
The Russians write of storms of feeling,
Longing, lovers lost and stuff.
They rend their clothes and tear their hair out,
Bared souls standing in the buff.
I am too WASP to wash my undies
In the public square with verse
That cuts and bleeds blood puddles,
That a doctor or a nurse
Would have to suture up with string
Or medicate some other way,
So I’ll just have to write these silly
Rambles till I see my way
Around these problems, loosen up,
And let my hair down. You can drink
From Passion’s cup and tell me all
About it. I won’t waste the ink.
Mrs. Hidley has been writing prose and poetry for her own amusement and that of her family and friends and others for most of her 73 years. And one of her ten grandchildren is named Kalliope. She has lived in Walla Walla, Washington; Frankfurt and Bremerhaven, Germany; Upper New York State; Enid, Oklahoma; Montgomery and Prattville, Alabama; Lubbock, Texas; Dover, Delaware; West Palm Beach, Florida; Goose Bay, Labrador; Washington, D.C.; Fairfield, California; Omaha, Nebraska; and now resides in Ojai (Nest-of-the-Moon), California, where she continues to write.
Sparks of Calliope 