Poem-A-Day

Beauty Queen Brahmani

by Rhonda Coullet

From childhood, 

able to understand, 

cosmic ideas as home.

Once a year, 

my neighbor sold books,

on a card table in her front yard,

25 cents a copy, 

metaphysical words in depth,

matching my mamaw’s oral rules

for living a good life.

Pearls, jewels of wisdom, 

from an unknown world, 

beyond her country church,

and the circuit preacher 

passing through once a month.

Hanging on the wall by her door,

a picture of Jesus knocking,

“If you meet me and forget me,

you have lost nothing,

if you meet him and forget him,

you have lost everything.”

Forced to leave her at eleven,

puberty claimed me.

I lived in a shroud of beauty,

inherited from handsome parents.

I was tempted to compete and conquer.

Born to a man’s world,

I learned to fight for freedom,

but I always lost in the end.

A lifetime later, 

I heard mamaw’s  voice,

in a mantra sung by a Guru.

A Swami willing to teach me,

called her  a saint, 

inspired by faith in life,

love as its only purpose.

Fifty years, she lived in a shack,  

but her back yard was the universe.

At ninety-seven, in a nursing home,

a shining forehead of gold,

she met a friend in the hall each day,

to recite the Lord’s Prayer, 

and shuffle blind,

down to the chapel to pray.

Fighting for freedom, 

anger as your sword,

is killing yourself with a drug.

We’re only alive when we love,

the light of cosmic consciousness,   

lets freedom find you,

like a book from a neighbor,      

a mamaw singing children to sleep. 

Freedom is forever, and for everyone,

it’s a promise heaven must keep.

~

About Rhonda Coullet . . .

Poems “The Long Unraveling” Published 2023 “Lenticular” magazine. “Linghara” Published 2022 “Poem-A-Day” poem, Rensselaerville Library.

Playwright/composer/lyricist: "Runaway Beauty Queen” Production Resume: The Martha's Vineyard Playhouse, Florida Studio Theatre, (Barbra Anton Playwriting Award, Sarasota Magazine's "Most Intriguing Autobiography")

Lyricist/Composer: "West Heaven" (Tribute song to John Belushi, SNL), "Bigger than the Both of Us" (Jimmy Buffet Grammy nom.)

Actress: Broadway: Starred in "The Robber Bridegroom" (Barry Bostwick, CD) & "Pump Boys and Dinettes." Starred in LA "Hair"

Actress: Off Broadway: "National Lampoon’s Lemmings" (4 CDs, C. Chase/Belushi/C. Guest). Starred in “Cowgirls"

TV/Film: "Mr. Mike's Mondo Video" singer with Paul Shafer, SNL Spinal Tap

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