2020 / poetry / author

OAKLEY MERIDETH

THIS IDEA IS
CALLED “FIRE”

…

Moses gulps smoke
in front of
a bush which
shimmers and chokes
but cannot burn away.
Jethro’s flock congregates
just out of frame
(they bleat without ceasing, convinced that noise
has a way of washing their path
and drawing them to cool water)

as the wide open music
of clean sparks
drifts towards heaven.

ASA NISI MASA

…

While falling free
from the blue tower

where there are no
windows or doors

and thorn bushes
clamber with roses

and push one another
deeper into space

while falling free
one realizes no gravity

is capable of thought
that only the falling

have time to think
they say to themselves–

I’m coming down through
the crimson viaducts

of deep space

I’m the last drinking water

Romans ever pumped

into the yonic premises

of ruined temples

asa nisi masa

bleed out into space

asa nisi masa

ice like a clavicle

fracturing in two asa nisi masa

like a clavicle

bracing the head of the moon

the blue tower (furnished

with blank, cobalt stones)

that climbs up

into the clean tunnel of stars

asa nisi masa asa nisi masa asa nisi masa

THIS IDEA IS
CALLED “SACRIFICE”

…

The tumult
of the moon
as it fades from white to red
followed by gyrations
not fit for orbit

(gasps of light starting just now to lose hibernation and crawl back toward heaven)

while here in the desert
there is hardly a clamor
just the goring blade
singing itself sharp
against a stone
beside the unfit grave.

GLORY

…

There was another broken twig
                                                                             betraying our location
see who else will find us
                                                                             I remember telling my love
as the great lookout fires
                                                                             extinguished on the opposite hill.
We wanted to call all of this
                                                                             darkness but the word has too little
poetry and the world
                                                                             has too little language
so we simply thought of ourselves
                                                                             as being un-illumined
and waited
                                                                             for those new footsteps
to charge up
                                                                             the ruby path
blushing with red leaves
                                                                             and yet not a path
disguised as it was
                                                                             with condom wrappers
and cigarette gum
                                                                             and great, pitiful
swaths of gray
                                                                             campfire ash
we were sure to be found
                                                                             any moment now
just two bullets of bruised lead
                                                                             evacuated from a deflowered cornucopia
set to decay
                                                                             on this svelte pocket of earth
marring the hill.