Enewetok Atoll, 1954

Tiny murex snail shell, talisman of sorrow,

Shaped like grenade or pandanus that's cracked,

Foundling from despoiled sea and atomic gallows.

Tiny murex snail shell, talisman of sorrow,

Left behind in diaspora that followed;

All poisoning traveled thru marrows intact.

Tiny murex snail shell, talisman of sorrow,

Shaped like grenade or pandanus that's cracked.

Laura Stickney 2025

Notes:

Enewetak Atoll-- Large atoll of islands

in the Marshall Islands. Forty-three 

atmospheric nuclear tests were conducted

by US military in Enewetak Atoll from 1948

to 1958. Enewetak Atoll is still radioactive

today. Contaminated soil is stored on site

within a huge concrete dome that itself is

cracking.  

Murex-- Marine gastropods. The snail shell

in photograph is a Tenguella granulata from

Enewetak Atoll.

Pandanus-- A tropical plant with fibrous, edible

fruit.

Diaspora-- At Enewetak Atoll, prior to nuclear

tests, people of Enewetak experienced forced

dispersion and removal from their original

homeland. They developed illnesses from

radioactive fallout and widespread contamination

throughout the area.

Photograph of murex snail shell by Laura Stickney

 

                                                     

Peche-Merle, France

Spotted horses depicted

On cave walls

Are riderless,

Disembodied hands

Rise over dappled

Flanks;

Burnt-bone pigments

Blown through reeds,

Fix gestures eternally--

Hands reach for equine

Belly,

Touch muzzle,

Crest backbone.

The mural's territory

Is dotted with aerosolized

Bursts--

Denoting continuum

Between beings.

It's now believed the palms

Are feminine hands:

Women navigated caves,

Ground red ochre,

Pounded carbonized matter,

Noticed rock outcropping

Mirroring a mare's head, neck

And chest.

As artists painted

Their limestone chamber,

They overlapped the horses,

Because they recalled herds

Grazing in sunlit world.

And then women emerged

From stoney entrails, befriended

Their subject matter,

               And rode, rode, away--

Laura Stickney 2025

Notes:

Peche Merle is a cave in France.

It houses paintings at least 29,000

years old.

Peche Merle paintings contain negative

hand stencils made my blowing paint

around an actual hand placed against 

rock wall.

Red ochre, iron oxide, is an intense 

red orange color.

 

Wings of Weeds           for Vilma Mendillo

Butterfly with wings of weeds,

Drills Rooty legs

Into riser seam

Of outside step;

The landed volant's

Fore and hind wings

Are formed out of 

Milk-thistle hackle

And spur.

A butterfly with wings of weeds

Does not flutter

But casts about the city,

As refuse, as surveyor:

Sees--

Elderly women dressed in black,

Forage for dandelion greens

Through patches of scrub,

Near freeway ramp.

Watches--

Young man behind drive-thru,

Cut hair of youth seated in

Swivel chair; both are obscured

By foliage.

Observes--

Lone figure wearing robe,

Crawl up muddy, root-strewn hill

Adjacent major intersection.

Butterfly with wings of weeds,

Colors of blush and tourmaline,

Descends to disturbed median;

Will exude tall stem in summer

Marked with purple flowerheads,

To confer its ancient balm.

Laura Stickney 2025

Notes:

volant--In heraldry, a being depicted

with its wings extended.

tourmaline--a gemstone in colors of 

red and green.

photograph of milk-thistle plant by

Laura Stickney

 

 

Records 1937

Little orange cone shell

Poises on edge

Of the Jaluit dock where

Amelia sits

After being captured

By Japanese soldiers

With her navigator Fred,

Following the downing

Of their plane

Onto coral atoll--

Little orange cone shell

Poises on edge

Of Jaluit dock,

Is not visible in clandestine

Photo of scene

Being taken from afar--

But there's the cargo ship,

Kōshū,

Towing Amelia's broken 

Electra on a barge,

As the injured Noonan

Grasps signpost on dock,

His hairline bright

In tropic sun--

Amelia stares at her plane,

Her bob-cut

A signature, her rounded

Shoulders I share,

That short sleeved-shirt

With bunched collar,

She often wore at home--

Little orange conus,

Records its journey

On the outside of its shell--

Triangles like pointers

Document waves and growth;

Amelia and Fred being brave,

Were fixed in brief moment

By recorder,

With many more clues

Through the years,

But we are told to not believe

Our eyes, to not connect sequences--

If a little shell can do it, why can't we?

Laura Stickney 2025

Notes:

Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan vanished

on the last leg of their round-the-world flight,

July, 1937.

Top photo-- is a covert image of Jaluit dock,

Marshall Islands, taken by an unknown

photographer.

Middle photo-- is right-half detail of the above image

showing larger ship Kōshū beyond dock towing Electra

Plane, Amelia sitting on dock's edge, her back facing 

photographer, and Fred, farthest to left on dock's far

corner near electricity poll.

Conus shell--type of shell found at Jaluit Atoll.

Shell patterns are a diary of the animal's 

life that can be read.

Laura Stickney, poet, has researched the story

of Amelia Earhart for many years. 

 

Solar Eclipse, July 11, 1991

The blazing coin, to be viewed askance,

Was bitten on my birthday--

Through mylar lens I glanced

The blazing coin, to be viewed askance,

And sketched its orbicular parlance

Of redaction and array--

The blazing coin, to be viewed askance,

Was bitten on my birthday--

Laura Stickney 2025

notes:

photograph--drawings of July 11,1991, 

solar eclipse from my journal, dated same day.

askance--with a side or oblique look

orbicular--circular or spherical; rounded out

parlance--language style, conversation

redaction--blocking out of sections

 

Chant

7 planets align tonight:

There's Mars full of conflict,

Venus bauble bright,

Jupiter looking small,

Thought he wants to be big--

Those orbs over my head can't see

Wandering people, migrating birds,

Or hear self-talk

I have an alcove in my chest

That holds my heart strangely

Like an altar-- and I tend its

Reverberating ledge--

Everyone has this grotto,

Too, inside--

I press my fingertips whorled 

And domed upon my neck

To feel a beat--

Such sounds are pulsing everywhere

Within our rubbling home

7 planets align tonight:

Mercury has gold shoes,

Saturn's dour even with ringlets,

Uranus was deposed by young'uns,

Neptune rules superheated seas--

Those planets are so small they look

Like tear duct crusts

I have an alcove in my chest

That holds my heart strangely

Like an altar-- and I tend its

Reverberating ledge--

Everyone has this grotto

Too, inside--

I press my fingertips whorled

And domed upon my neck,

Feel signaling notes--

Heretherethennow

Backforthnearfar

A chant of no divide

Laura Stickney 2025

Notes:

alignment of 7 planets took place

on February 28, 2025

engraving of planetary system of

Copernicus, 1855

 

Degrees      for my father John Stickney

In 40's photo

Palm tree fronds pointed

North, south, east, west

And degrees in-between;

A compass of brittle green

Behind soldiers posing

With female companions

Near Hollywood Palladium's

Curved marquee.

My young dad,

New to West Coast,

Wore his Army uniform

And sported sunglasses

To sightsee. He mentions

"Mary Lou" on snapshot's

Reverse. She too donned

Dark lenses, and I wonder,

Who's that gal? 

I've got

Dad's wartime photograph

Affixed to my dash

And drive around town

Looking for picture's

Exact locale.

The Art Deco venue

Remains,

Duo-lamp street lights

Are gone,

Extending palms 

Stripe sidewalks

With shade.

I'm amazed to see

The Hollywood Community

Hospital a block south

From where my father

And his friends stood

Sixty years before.

Dad could never

Have imagined,

The facility where

He'd pass away,

Would rise behind

His shoulder.

I see my father flying

Above my ear,

He is small like a feather,

He wears the khakis

I bought for him,

And one of the soft knit shirts.

Near the end he said

They had put weights

In his shoes, made it

Too heavy to walk,

It only told me he was

Getting ready to launch--

I drive east on Sunset,

Unruly crowns flare

Atop gray caudices,

Station sides of thoroughfare,

All compasses of brittle green--

Laura Stickney  20025

notes:

caudices-- Trunks of palm trees. pronounced: 

ko' di-sees

photograph of my father with companions,

Sunset Boulevard, c. 1943