“Love Recognizes no Barriers,
Love jumps hurdles, leaps fences,
penetrates walls to arrive
at its destination full of hope”
— Maya Angelou
ThePoetry
“Sestina” by Allegra Jostad Silberstein
Sestina for my Long Lost Sister
I wake this morning to a clear blue sky,
The same color as the eyes of my sister.
With her blue eyes she saw a little mouse
Playing in a field of poppies
Under the essence of lavender
Beneath the flight of seagulls.
Casting shadows, up flew the seagulls
Higher and higher in the azure sky
Far above the garden of lavender
That brings thoughts of my long lost sister
Who loved a field filled with golden poppies
Where we used to play and found a mouse.
Where love nibbled like a soft gray mouse
And circled around us like soaring gulls.
I want to walk again in fields of poppies
With clear thoughts and cloudless skies,
Walk again with my long lost sister
Lulled by her special scent of lavender.
That sweet essence of lavender
Delighted the senses of the little mouse.
No one loved him like my sister.
The air was alive with circling seagulls
Gliding and soaring through the sky,
Far above the golden poppies.
As I walk in the light of poppies,
My nose tickled with purple lavender
Clouds form a face in the sky
Looking down on the little gray mouse
Through a circle of soaring seagulls
And I remember my sister,
My beautiful long lost sister
Who played with me in fields of poppies
Under the wheeling flight of seagulls
Lured by the wild scent of lavender
Rescued from sadness by a small gray mouse
Watched overhead by the face in the sky
Where my sister dances in lavender
With a magical mouse and a flutter of seagulls
As I look to the sky from a field of poppies.
ThePoets&ThePoetesses
Allegra Jostad Silberstein
Allegra Jostad Silberstein, a retired teacher, dancer and philanthropist, was named the first Poetry Laureate of Davis in 2010. She has featured poems in many anthologies, including The Sacramento Anthology: One Hundred Poems, Gatherings, A Woman’s Place and Where Do I Walk, and has also published poems in Poetry Depth Quarterly, The Yolo Crow, Blue Unicorn, Rattlesnake Press, Poetry Now, Iodine Poetry, Poetry of the New West and California Quarterly. You can visit her website at DavisPoet.net or catch her at poetry nights around town, including The Poetry Night Reading Series hosted by Dr. Andy Jones every first and third Thursday at John Natsoulas Gallery.
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