Wilderness Interface Zone

if a heart broke once forever would it
not be a dead thing?
yea, a heart is a lively creature, filled
with quiet musings,
subtle thrummings,
murmurous hummings.
aye, she is rapturous and verdant,
swindling common sense
with fictive branches
white with blossoms.
yet, she is the taproot of things,
descending through
the earth warm
with worms, and moist.
nay, she does not die.
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Elizabeth Pinborough graduated from Yale Divinity [...]

Roses are red;
Their odor is heady.
LONNOL month’s here–
Are your Valentines ready?
It’s Love of Nature Nature of Love Month on Wilderness Interface Zone, and we’re looking to publish love abroad.  Do you have a message of friendship and love you’d like to send someone? WIZ is looking for original poetry, essays, blocks of fiction, art, music [...]

The larks trilled their cries that
Nested in my ears in birdsong.
I saw the thaw of winter had begun.
Soon spring would rush in on her
Pastel heels bringing forth blooms.
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To read Linda’s bio and enjoy more of her verse on WIZ go here, here, and here.

the hand of winter stretched out
his grey gloves and poured snow
out of his pitcher it fell upon the
world in cold numbing waves it
washed away all the colors of fall —
it beat back my favorite lilies into
the hand of white dust like people
are prone to beat one another into
the dust for a sense of self worth. [...]

I watched as the white of snow
starched the earth clean of sins —
like the Savior washed me white
by his blood.  It seemed a stark
contrast of his shedding white for
red and the earth shedding scarlet
for white, but I think He favors the
irony just as much as we do. I stood
in the bone numbing cold of winter,
letting [...]

I watched the world around me;
winter swallowed me in snow —
the skies were somber and grey.
Only a cardinal pierced the scene
of melancholy waves that washed
their newness upon the earth with
the promise of renewed hope.  As
the pains of yesterday were taken
from the land in ivory tears, I was
poured into chalices of reflection.
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Linda Crate is a Pennsylvanian [...]

In the tar-like black sky
structures float like ghosts
through the illumination from bulbs
hovering like flying saucers over
the road. No heavenly
luminaries accompany me on this lonely journey.
Only those cones of light brighten the route ahead.
Nevertheless, I must persist.
I am a modern Hebrew
fleeing the Egypt of the office, escaping to
the Promised Land of the field. There,
as I stand [...]

I meet a young couple in the canyon. A dog in their company tells me more about them than they guess. I see a piñon pine tree alight with fall sunshine. As I exit the canyon, I discover a prying eye. This is another long and the last installment in this series but it isn’t [...]

In which I make my way into Crossfire Canyon and meet a wondrous bird.  I muse upon the experience of eye contact with other species, referencing N. Scott Momaday and Martin Buber.  I see the light, loose and free in the canyon–it’s beautiful. Part one here, part two here, part three here.
As I worked [...]

In part three, the mental illness storyline continues, but the mystery of the cause of Mark’s troubles comes somewhat to light. I muse upon the idea that when misfortune besets you, others watching from a distance sometimes suppose you must have done something to deserve it. Just when I think everything’s on the upswing, my [...]