Translation Back Into Native Tongues
By Poetry Issue 81
Sometimes, I miss the Aramaic of youth. Then, the personal flame came over us and we spoke to the numb nations— until the nations winnowed and muted us, but not breaking the spirit of our speech. Now, I live in the breeze’s murmur, the native tongues to which the soul responds, a language that comforts…
Read MoreComing into the Kingdom
By Poetry Issue 81
Coming into the kingdom I was like a man grown old in banishment, a creature of hearsay and habit, prayerless, porous, a survivor of myself. Coming into the kingdom I was like a man stealing into freedom when the tyrant dies, if freedom is freedom where there are no eyes to obstruct it, if the…
Read MoreBewilder
By Poetry Issue 83
He made the Leviathan for the sport of it, The Lord of my childhood. Her fluke The size of two sleek rowboats For lifting and drawing down Knifelike into the water Or for slapping—so many gestures A fluke or fin can make with or Without ruin. I remember A whale rolling sideways Just—it appeared—so I…
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