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                 Sea Shell Memories
                     by Sondra Ball

                     A tiny and exquisite shell
                     rests on my palm,
                     gleaming purple and gold
                     in the chandelier’s light.
                     I close my eyes and hear
                     the crashing of waves on stones,
                     the moaning of wind
                     against barren naked cliffs.
                     A cold rain is falling,
                     splashing against my blue slicker,
                     dripping over my hood.
                     Lightning flashes through dark clouds.
                     I stoop for a moment
                     and reach down into a damp hole
                     between two large boulders.
                     I stand up and open my hand.
                     A tiny and exquisite shell
                     rests on my palm.
                           copyright © 2003 sondra ball


                     Poetry Is the Way
                     by Sondra Ball

                     Poetry is the way
                     I make my world.

                     The shape of a poem
                     becomes a branch trembling.

                     The beat of a poem
                     becomes cold snow
                     falling on an icy lake,
                     warm sun above maples.

                     The sound of words
                     becomes the song of a sparrow,
                     the sigh of ice skates,
                     the scream of wind.

                     As I describe people
                     parting and embracing,
                     I plumb the depths
                     of birth and death,
                     rape and delight,
                     hope and despair.

                     And that plumbing
                     creates meaning
                     out of the tender
                     and the terrible
                     moments
                     of my life.
                           copyright © 2003 sondra ball


                     White Antelope’s Song
                     By Sondra Ball

                     The children screamed before the guns at Sand Creek under autumn sun
                     while the death song of White Antelope rang out across the sands,
                            “Nothing lives long except the earth and the mountains.”

                     It was the only end could come from those who followed fife and drum
                     across the grasses waving through the miles of open land.
                           “Nothing lives long except the earth and the mountains.”

                     They only saw with blinded eyes an old man who seemed so unwise
                     to stand where soldiers’ raging guns would press him to the sand.
                           “Nothing lives long except the earth and the mountains.”

                     Their eyes were blind; they could not know the truth White Antelope
                     would show,
                     as he sang clear and loud across the miles of open land,
                          “Nothing lives long except the earth and the mountains.”

                     Their own fate and their children’s lives were predetermined by that
                     strife
                     to be a cry for peace destroyed by blood stains on the sand.
                           “Nothing lives long except the earth and the mountains.”

                                                Published SQN, summer, 1997
                                                Copyright 1997 Sondra Ball