4.2

22 May 2017

Large Canvas

There are ghosts
for whom a gentle salutation might balm an
urge to escape the cut of stretched-out flax,
to pull to the world you’ve created the crux
of all your fears.

m.

sat in the sun to grow old
into a tree that tends to orchids,
into a star that lives in the downward slope
of my nose

Inheritance

…the famine leaving all

the trees bereft of their bark, the villagers so
grateful for something, anything, to chew on.

speaking in tongues

mother says: separation of voice
poet says: behave, moonbeam
mother says: the way you tell the moon to behave is transgressive, not Chinese
poet says: my voice is a splinter

For Beauty is Nothing

When science fiction veers dangerously close to reportage, when a poem gives you news you can hardly bear, how do we keep opening ourselves to these texts, these poems? Can we take solace in the old trees…knowing that no matter what we do, the Earth will survive us, even in some terribly beautiful, almost unrecognizable form?