Where the Word Begins
I end, or so it seems.
Small comfort
in the light of that lamp
reflecting from the window,
a low, interior moon
subject to whim and
circumstance.
And how do we retract
those unsaid lines,
heartfelt and meant,
but never expressed?
The hoot owl voices my response.
“Where the Word Begins” was first published in December 2018 at Amethyst Review. Thank you, Sarah Law, for accepting this poem.
Palinode (egg, politics, pathology)
Who determines completion if not the morning’s best
layer? The answer is what comes first, not the
question, which replenishes the old deviltry: I am not
whole: I am partial: I am absent: you. Please define
node. Taking exception, rules mediate the norm. Fried,
poached, scrambled, radiated, coddled, baked, raw,
boiled, I serve myself, and in turn am served, when,
truth be told, I’d rather serve you. Twice.
I’d rather serve you twice than be pushed aside, a
thimbleful of nectar fermented and forgotten in
someone’s late pantry. Or worse, cast into the Pacific,
swallowed by a Fukushima-fed tuna, caught and
auctioned to an Alaskan sushi chef and left to molder
at week’s crossing. The point at which a wave has an
amplitude of zero, or a pathological swelling. That one
moment of clarity before night’s fall.
That one moment of clarity before night’s fall at
Juneau’s 716 Calhoun Avenue, which posits the
ability to see beyond sight: the blind hen produces
more, never pausing to consider repercussive issues.
Progeny, pathological swellings, statements of the
incurious. Do we use squirmish? I take, or am given,
offense. Without you, I am the silence preceding the
letter, an untoward growth, the silence remaining.
Without you, I am the silence preceding the letter
terminating at vision’s end: a fence, the Phoenician
form which birthed H, or two posts joined at
midsection and later, abandoned. Breach. Enough.
One’s last egg brought to fruition, a terminus in
thought or language carelessly placed. A bruising
point between vanishing waves or carted through
our long nights. Denial. The pathology revealed.
“Palinode (eggs, politics, pathology) first appeared at ISACOUSTIC* in October 2019. Many thanks to editor Barton Smock for his tireless efforts to promote poetry and poets.
The Stone Remains Silent Even When Disturbed
In whose tongue
do you dream?
I fall closer to death
than birth, yet
the moon’s sliver
still parts the bare
branches and an unfilled
trench divides the
ground. Bit by bit,
we separate – you
remain in the earth,
recumbent, as I gather
years in stride.
Even the rain
leaves us alone.
This first appeared in December 2015.
Nine Variations of a Cloud
1
Looking up, I renounce pity and the sadness of wind.
2
Only lust pulls and shapes more, diminishing your integrity.
3
It slips through whenever I try to grab it.
4
Every phrase is a window glowing at night, surrendered to its frame.
5
Water in another form is still water.
6
In whose ruins must you survive?
7
Another shape, another moment desperately spent.
8
And still you thrive in diminishment.
9
Bearing nothing, it conceals.
* * *
“Nine Variations of a Cloud” first appeared in Kindle Magazine in December 2015, and was also included in Gossamer: An Anthology of Contemporary World Poetry.
Firewood
For two years the oak
loomed, leafless.
We had aged
together, but somehow
I survived the drought
and ice storms, the
regret and wilt,
the explosions within,
and it did not.
I do not know
the rituals of trees,
how they mourn
a passing, or if
the sighs I hear
betray only my own
frailties, but even
as I fuel the saw and
tighten the chain,
I look carefully
for new growth.
“Firewood” is included in my chapbook, From Every Moment a Second.
Bone to Bone
He claims two sides frame every story.
I count three, sometimes more,
believing in multiplicity,
threats concealed
but never
buried. A dust devil twists across the path.
What ascends, what dies?
Heat, ashes. A shadow’s flesh.
The earth, restraining all.
“Bone to Bone” first appeared here in June 2016.
Last year I was fortunate to have work included in two anthologies. The first, Indie Blu(e) Publishing’s As the World Burns: Writers and Artists Reflect on a World Gone Mad, is a 348-page “anthology of poetry, prose, essay, and art inspired by the unprecedented events of the year 2020.” Featuring 114 writers and artists from ten countries, As the World Burns chronicles the madness and horrors of the past year. The voices are diverse — raw and polished, young and old, experienced and new — and they reflect a populace whose needs have been unmet and ignored all too long. In time this volume will stand as one of the most powerful literary artifacts of this mad year.
Edited by Kindra M. Austin, Candice Louisa Daquin, Rachel Finch, and Christine E. Ray.
Available through Amazon in paperback and via Kindle.
Unlike As the World Burns, No More Can Fit Into the Evening: An Anthology of Diverse Voices is not a collection of themed pieces. Rather, its purpose is to offer a substantial grouping of poems (5-10) by each contributor, allowing readers to obtain a more nuanced flavoring of the poets’ work. Thus the 350+ page anthology presents only 39 poets. The anthology includes well known writers like Terence Winch, Kimberly Blaeser, James Janko and John Looker, as well as lesser knowns like, well, me. This is a perfect winter’s evening read. Dip into it and perhaps you’ll find a new favorite poet. At the very least you’ll find hours of entertainment, and much food for thought.
Edited by Thomas Davis and Standing Feather
The book is being distributed by Ingram, and should be available (if not in stock, through special order) through bookstores in the U.S., Great Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. It’s also available through Amazon.
A Brief History of Babel
Borders, windows.
Sound.
Trudging up the steps, I am winded after six flights,
my words smothered in the breathing.
The Gate of God proffers no favors.
When the spirit gives me utterance, what shall I say?
Curiously, no direct link exists between Babel and babble.
A collective aphasia could explain the disruption. One’s
inability to mouth the proper word, another’s
fluency impeded by context.
A stairway terminating in clouds.
Syllable by twisted syllable, dispersed.
Separated in symbols.
And then,
writing.
To see the sunrise from behind a tree, you must face
east: higashi, or, a discrete way of seeing
the structure of language unfold.
Two characters, layered. One
thought. Direction.
Connotation. The sun’s
ascent viewed through branches
as through the frame
of a glassless
window.
Complexity in simplicity.
Or the opposite.
I have no desire to touch heaven, but my tongues reach where they will.
Who can know what we say to God, but God?
And the breeze winding through, carrying fragments.
* * *
My poem, “A Brief History of Babel,” was drafted during the August 2015 Tupelo Press 30-30 challenge, and was subsequently published at Bonnie McClellan’s International Poetry Month celebration in February 2017.
The Underbelly of This Seam
Slides beneath your gaze, unnoticed,
but the joining satisfies that particular
urge, combining two separates
into one whole, creating this new
piece. I thumb the string on every fourth
beat, anchor the cloth, pull it taut, and stitch.
What better material than air and silence?
Yesterday’s tune, tomorrow’s silk?
A fine breath zigzagged down the edge – frayed
lines, beneath, on the other side, testifying
to the struggles of the unseen. I exhale,
strike another note. You hum something new.
* * *
“The Underbelly of This Seam” was drafted during the August 2016 Tupelo Press 30/30 Challenge. Many thanks to Ursula, who sponsored the poem and provided the title.
Cyclops
Boundless loss, hemmed at the edges.
Another mended hole, wasted mornings.
Unwound, I towel off, extract loose hair.
Look for messages in the clouds, see
only deceit. I am sick with
joy. I no longer sing. My goats
shun me. Where is the love,
the missing fact. An albino
squirrel skitters up the oak.
I think of blood, of bone fragments.
The pleasures of rendering.
“Cyclops” first appeared in September 2019 at Recenter Press, a publisher “dedicated to sharing work that is grounded in both the spiritual and the material.” Many thanks to the editors for taking these pieces.
O at the Edges 