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it was not the arc of a star- Boat tail grackles wove a river of possibilities where each scar became eye, it was not a song of our grandmothers from beyond pines, buried in flesh, bone close, blade thin, what must be carried, weight of singing, of the gone, an edge, tasting of blood, navel oranges, pie lemons, calamondin, an incandescence living in my flesh, glyphs of their own light, their own life, divination begins with my shoulder blade, another bone tossed on the pile, a pyre stacking itself into a ceremony of absences, without moonlight desire floats with owls, glide path of palms, asphalt, gravel, we are such, an aggregate laid down for the passage of others, so many carcasses trundled into pavement, with the random divination of bird tracks, as day burns, we burn, as ash reveals, stars unfold, as stragglers croak their way out to the rookery, we remain cindered, land bound, a reliquary of unattained salvation, a singing whittled down, stacked fatwood desiring flame, all our dreams arrive here, shore of burning, songs mangrove verdant, tangled in drifts of shell. -Dog has a pumpkin head- it was the season of rhymes, pig killing, wood burning, whiskey, you said your brother wouldn't care who I was, true enough as he only spoke to the dog and the stove, his back porch navel oranges, kumquats, cabbage palms, a bougainvillea blood dark flowering, eating canned peaches fished from a cooler of tall boys, you said I was good enough for your bed, the back of your bike, biscuits at your kitchen table, second drawer in your dresser, ''Sit, so listen, there's no redemption, just atonement, and there's no end to that." Sour gum flowering gathered up into honey, we chewed the comb as if adopted by bears, living off saw palmetto berries and grubs, or the other flesh, thorn of my tongue, word pierced, we are without, not of, not within time, hinged sky, a mollusk drying out between tides, barnacled wind bent, current woven, taste skin, taste wind, taste salt, how blade manifests a dream life, tongue balanced, taut with lace of scars, a sargassum float of entanglement, small crabs, sea turtles, it was the season of arrivals, no hint yet of the horizon closing upon us, the other fruit ripening on the tree, absence overtaking, hand over fist. -Pithlachascotee River - Some Sunday she said from the kitchen to the breezeway, "Suffer not a witch", left before dinner, walked to the landing, where possibilities survive immersion, current relentlessly flowing, took the skiff downriver, followed a creek into the mangrove, abandoned habitation, learned tide, names of wind, to thatch with palmetto to polish the blade, circular motion of sharpening, stone of susurration honing the heart, hatchet of tongue riving chunks of fatwood to feed hands of flame, cupped with each evening, there is a singing on the breeze, a litany of pollination, a triumph of flowering, night fills my ears as sparks of fireflies float over the verdure of burning, praise laced with woodsmoke, wave summoned tide manifests this form, an expression of sea, a liver of possibilities, a cloud filled lung, breath of a thicker atmosphere, ponderous flight as form reveals itself to sky. Sun folded away in its blue coverlet, you cannot drink from this broken cup of sky spilling moon, skillet on the fire, clouds stack on the horizon, spoonbill stretching wing into shade, egrets lifting over mangrove, we lived for a while on black coffee and bacon, shouldering a river door wind walks through, trailing night and a glory of stars, we gathered the taste of names, memory is flesh, trees speak of it, questioned which half holds the spoon, which half lifts the bowl, which eye is on the horizon, weather coiling beyond curve of sea. As fireflies are shards of air cracked by lightning, we name ourselves that sea may know us, salt tasting salt, coiled into wave of remembrance, the whistle and click each song must pass through to reach open water where emerald shimmers into cobalt, lifting such light as we can from all this broken, edges balanced on fingertips, a divide between what glitters and what sinks quietly, some days my dress is burlap, sometimes a hank of sea borrowed from wave, tide uncoiled from one hand the other dipped into river, filtering a current of unintended sorrow, where the gone has lifted onto breeze, silence feathers its nest beneath tongue, magnolia opening slowly with morning or question swallowing word, sometimes I am spoonbill, head down wading, a roseate flowering in an unnamed forest striding into darkness, sometimes there is a face in the mirrored waters, sometimes it is mine, sometimes a voice, wave lifted, sometimes we speak but the voice is never mine, face of water, voice of wind, a sound from the edge of all things.
Peach Delphine is a queer poet from Tampa, Florida. Former cook infatuated with what remains of the undeveloped Gulf coast and blackwater rivers.
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author & https://poetrylifeandtimes.com See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)