Beneath the ramble and catch
of tumbleweed: the lull of horizon
delicious with distance and elegy,
dead-ends and blue highways hoarse
with the whisper of wind, dust,
wood, bone, memory—the grist
of solitude stirred up
the morning you woke determined
to pluck the sun from God’s thigh
as he passed, full-stride,
over this side of town. That’s
how Jacob got new-named, you say
when the story comes [...]
Come slip between atmospheres of memory.
Knead yourself into cumulus—your airline ticket,
your pushbike, your liahona—with fingers like
the fingers of Doré’s sun. Sift marrow
until you feel soil part, feel the fern press its head
through mist then flatten against sudden emptiness.
Until you can roam sky without tripping on God’s
hem, can cloak in light
without singeing every shadow to ash, [...]
Self portrait with closed eyes
like a brumal serpent
listening to Earth
shed her crystalline
skin, slip off her chill
at dawn’s seductions
supple as hibernacula
warm with bodies
slendering into instinct
and appetite—Eden’s
infinite metaphors
sidled up to God’s breast,
areola iron on the tongue,
milk rich from desire’s simmer
and slow burn, the flame
set low so not to sear the soul
still this side of vision, lurking
like the [...]
1. 27 November 2006, Morning
They’d said it would come,
with December just around the bend.
Still it caught me off guard. Outside
in pajama pants, t-shirt, bare feet, waiting
for the dog to make: the first flakes layered
cornered leaves with winter’s afterbirth.
2. 16 July 2003: Our First
The day Sidney was born,
her water came
on the bathroom floor. As I’d layered
a [...]
(February–March 2000)
crimson-honey sky
across the Hokianga
crimson-honey tide
but no waka to pierce
the bay’s narrow hips
*
crimson-honey sand
across the Hokianga
crimson-honey sky
but only one cumulus
to lick the bay’s narrow tongue
*
crimson-honey night
across the Hokianga
but no moon
to walk empty shores
sip crimson-honey tea
________________________________________________________________
For Tyler’s bio and other Spring Poetry Runoff contributions, click here and here.
*Non-contest submission*
(For Beikake)
both in white sarong
I bend you through the font
watch fabric rise
on water troubled
by the currents of death
______________________________________________________________
Mateu, Matem (Gilbertese): “my death, your death.”
_____________________________________________________________
For Tyler’s bio and his other submission to the Spring Poetry Runoff, go here.
*Non-contest submission*
Haere mai:
I’ve anticipated your soul-deep
craw. Stewed pork bones and potatoes
to tender verging on cream. Sent the kids,
brown bodies sliding between the breeze,
to gather more puha from the fenceline.
Sonchus oleraceus: slides from the tongue
into the boil just long enough to soften
the cellulose, give the broth enough bite
to open the palate, throw windows wide
on sense. To bathe [...]
Stand of Trees (by J. Kirk Richards)
I’ve been neglecting what it takes
to piece together dawn from old
snapshots and reminiscence faded
as the blush from Adam’s skin
when God’s question stunned
the garden and he slipped with Eve into
the shadow of God’s voice, their shame
a stand of trees backlit by cherubim
come hounds a-bay to flush them into
death, sin, recognition, [...]
by Tyler Chadwick
The crow lays roadside,
fully dead, its swollen body
trimmed with grass. Its head,
cropped with beads of dew,
cocks awkwardly to one side,
the top eye muting the sky
in a flat, milky gaze, beak
cracked in perpetual “caw,”
though no sound escapes
save the rasp of leaves
tripped by the wind
through this wooded suburban lull.
___________________________________________________________
Originally published in Black Rock & Sage [...]
My happy thanks to everyone who participated in WIZ’s People Month. My list of folks for whom I’ve felt deeply grateful includes:
Th.
Nephi Anderson (via Th.’s gravelly voice)
Mark Bennion
Tyler Chadwick
greenfrog
green mormon architect
Elizabeth R.
And, of course, many thanks to WIZ’s loyal readers and commenters.
I appreciate each writer’s help keeping People Month on WIZ interesting and fun. We’ll do it again next [...]