Parity Revisited

by Cleveland Heights Poet Laureate Ray McNiece

after

Parity Revisited

by Patti Fields and Ray Juaire

It’s difficult to decipher this complicity.

We believe our love letters will outlast

the stars, will at least be mentioned

in the same breath as that burning

ps. I’m with you all the time…

As if there were ever any separation

between you, me and the planets.

Words comprise, maybe, the orgone,

that plasm connecting everything —

fleeting as they are, paper thin, glued

to a model of the sun, that hangs

by a thin thread over our lives.

We can etch sentiments into metal,

fire them onto a template even,

but in the end, mumbles, in the end,

silence, even from this monument

of love, no lips to whisper as if

kissing again, parity revisited.

Patti Fields and Ray Juaire, Artists: Sculptors Patti Fields and Ray Juaire often transform a variety of media to create artwork that, at times, symbolizes their professional and personal relationship and explores issues of place and memory. Their work can be singular or done in small series that play with balance, utilizing dynamic forms, conceptual narratives, and a re-imagined history of the objects they incorporate in each of their pieces. They suggest new histories in the combinations of fabricated and found objects and work to create metaphors for the nucleus of human, scientific, and metaphysical relationships. For the first time, the couple is showing a few solo works together, carving out new territory.

Ray McNiece, Poet: Ray McNiece, Poet: McNiece is the current Cleveland Heights Poet Laureate. He is the author of 11 books of poems and monologues – Dis, (Burning River Press 1989) The Bone-Orchard Conga ( Wordsmith Press 1994), The Road that Carried Me Here (Bottom Dog), Song that Fathoms Home (Bottom Dog), and Wet Sand Raven Tracks (deep cleveland), Us — Talking Across America (Fractal Edge Press),  Us Versus (Fractal Edge Press), Our Way of Life (Bottom Dog), Love Song for Cleveland (Red Giant), and Breath Burns Away, New Haiku (Red Giant, 2019) two solo theatre works – Dis – Voices From a Shelter, Us? Talking Across America, two music/poetry collaborations – Mouth Music, A Rust bowl Hootenanny, and one collaborative theatre work – Homegirl meets Whiteboy— with Shawn Jackson.

Please enjoy this video for Ekphrastacy October 2020 in Response to Independent Together: 30 Years of Collaboration:

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