stopping byby Ryki Zuckerman |
|
(for poet Robert Frost who died in 1963)
the wind blew his hair across his face, as he squinted, snowblind, † in the brilliant cold of early January and tried to tame the pages and his eyes, the world waiting for his new words, his inaugural poem for our fair young prince, who we would lose later the same year frost left us;
the wind blew sparks of hope into all eyes, that day in 1961, when frost, unable to see in the snow glare, recited, instead, from memory “the gift outright”: “the land was ours before we were the land’s...”
the wind blows the old dream across the face of despair, the dream that was ours before we were the dream’s, some hollow melody skips across the road we took that led us to this precipice, where we are still at the edge of the woods gazing up at the falling snow. |
|
Intake Crib Lighthouse-1920by Paul A. White |
|
I want to be the man who lives in the water intake on the lake. It’s a fine, round, stone edifice with a circular, steel roof. It’s almost a hundred years old, surrounded by water and sky. I’d have to have a motor boat to get groceries on Tuesdays.
Inside my house there is a hole where water pours in forever, a waterfall coils down in darkness and knows no end to washing the inner depths of my abode— my history, my name, everything a smooth and sleek pathway.
Everyone would know of the hermit who lives in the circular stone house, standing alone out on the lake. His home provides water for everyone to drink. I want to be that man who lives, Zebra mussels grow on his chin. |
|
resuscitateby Lauren Stern |
|
one day his mind will falter. Memories will slip thru frostbit fingers.
fatigue will grind the gears, jam the gerunds into’ gorges of forget.
rough russet rots on guts of a railroad, the rust of machines at rest. |