Skies above the thicket
set aflame north of here:
rosy fingered fucking dawn,
a crowd of spawned-out salmon
under black cottonwood.
Limbs frame the strath
hung already with snow.
A small room choked
with fatty smoke threw
a glint so slight
as to redouble the dark
between the peaks, between them—
or us, intricate & muddled.
At every sound I was undone,
demolished, diminished.
You dreamt I walked once,
across the ice, to find you.
It was moving always. I,
a girl disappeared,
not carnelian propelled
forth: but waste wax
& fine wire. & so we were
bound together. Elsewhere
wind moves through
the crowns of trees
beyond a window, like weather
impends over some ocean
infixed within. I am not there
& never was. Together,
perhaps, we will fare.
Or you will go & I will follow,
sinew stitched through skin
on skin—as you do not hesitate,
but decide when to set in motion
& then keep moving. The crab
who loves her lure is kept on,
hoisted, after her line’s been
lifted through seawater
scooped clear of slush ice
as it forms: frazil in a current
of constant movement
against the stiff disbelief
that ice cannot issue from
the depths of this
or any other sea.
& if suddenly I
imagine the boards
burnt if boards remain,
nothing’s left but memory.
My firstborn asserts:
these are lines, this is sound
&
this is the speaker.
Until we come to a stand
of tall grass with long roots
in loose sand, I leave aside
interpretation, remission
& removal.
A horizon of blue-white silk,
a wide snow-scoured contoured
hillside thick with thoughts
tugged & stuck
in a scrub of willows.
How time passes just as the light
does: it darkens & is gone.
Very drafty. If you like this poem, please consider supporting my project here: http://www.usaprojects.org/project/ugiuva_miuguru_a_i_am_from_king_island