Knife dreams of stone and wire
of edge, curling upon itself,
wire, once burnished away, reveals
the sinuous and bright word of cutting,
the long tongue of scar tasting bitter orange,
laceration stained hibiscus flowering,
rain sluiced into the bay, sweltering cauldron,
broth of migrations.
We did not dwell, ephemeral precludes
habitation, residency is the privilege
of those less soluble, less phosphorescent ,
we left no trace, no photographs, not even ash,
mouthfuls of sunset and the shimmy
of gossamer night unfolding every horizon.
Room could not contain, windows
being more than apertures, points
of egress where we vanished into the breathing
of sea, iron bellied clouds concealed as weather,
tide of carrying, tide of shell calling us by name,
those once lost, those who could not remain.
Voice at the ear, voice of the cloud,
swirling through palms as wet prairie
opens itself in a supplication of frog singing
lit by lightning, sleepless wet season,
irrigation ditches filling with water
not yet dark, not yet caramelized,
our names flow through creeks, cypress
knees, long plumes of moss licking
the surface as we make our way
out to the flashing jacks, silvered
mullet, tangle of mangrove, leaves
salt frosted and blazing verdure.
Accompanied by gifts, shelf clouds
piling on shore, white feathered egrets,
slivers of lightning, the low glide of pelicans,
we receive more than we can make in return,
we name more than we can remember, endless
recitation against erosion, we are bound to voice
of tide, of wind, raucous calls of rookeries
where our dreams slowly feather, singing
their way into flight, drawing us from roof
and door, returning us to a world without habitation,
without the naming of place, tides of giving
washing our bones smooth as wave, moon bright,
curling in the mouth of conch, relentlessly.
Speaking of Home, Beyond the Wind
All thaw and sweltering, not yet
season of moonflower or sphinx moth,
sleeping by day, dreaming of manatees,
buoyant in the spring, blue flow silvered
with schooling jacks, jumping mullet,
boiling white sand, living by the light of a cold flame,
speaking to the mirrored burning,
lost as we are, on the margins, talking
to the moon in less dangersous
than conversations with men, which is more
dangerous than swimming with alligators,
shadows treading water, elegant logs
with shining eyes, the weather here
is affectionate full of heat and damp,
thunderstorms brewed up for the taste of coldness.
Lightning licking its way through cypress
and pine, the dog wedges herself
under the table as the cracking approaches,
sizzling despite the rain, gouging out
long strands of bark from the pine next door,
waiting for this, bursts of illumination
wind straining at the oak, a song
out of darkness, an answering voices,
a defiance of what would deny us
the everyday gentleness and motion
of tide, nightgown soaked, shiver
in my voice, the dog is not amused
at any venturing out in the rain.
Some can't abide tangle and clutter
of thicket, slash of straight line wind
and deadfall, shaggy cabbage palms
or the wicker woven arms and knees
of mangrove, some can't abide
that their god has not yet struck us down,
or caust us from the precipice,
or that we are not afraid, having known
the song of the blade for so long
we have become the flowering
no edge will part from the earth,
the vine that will not fail, the fox
sleeping in the shade of oak and cedar,
a wave rolling out of the Gulf no fence
will restrain, no hand will push down,
no prayer will deny that we are such as we are,
wind in our hair, sea in our eyes,
fragmented and worn, we too will add our shells
to this shore, to the constant arrival of tide and star
of moon and sun, to the constant repetition
of the litany of belonging.
Flat
Water, not anguish, lifts oaks
the first steps of flight, yet leaves
cannot overcome the heaviness
of memory, so much despair soaked
into the aquifier drawn forth, hydraulics
of root, trunk and limb, beyond the trees
blanket flower, railroad vine, gulls
facing windward, waves stacked
on sandbar
Brittle is how the tooth cracks,
blade chips on bone, the self shatters,
shards pooling on the floor, resolve
to endure vanishing as cold sets in,
warmth flowing out, body anticipating
the glide into quietude.
Arc flows through a line
in the sand, it is a far shore, sea
flowing from here to there, a woman
inscribes glyphs in the sand,
what is mending, the cup once broken
becomes new, the shell remade speaks
of a ghost, without hymn or prayer
we are without, unattached against sun and rain.
When you're small
and want to vanish but don't know how,
there's no way to see how you'll learn
to turn the pain inside out and eat it
like an orange or how fifty years will pass,
the hard cold breath of morning cracking
sternum, memory will come, as stealthy
as wind as the taste of the sea ever on the tongue
salt and the swell of wave, tide washing
through lacerations, scars forming a text,
a chart of what horizon long ago swallowed,
submerged lands.
A drowning that returned you, moon pale,
a form that cannot leave the sea, facing
oaks and pine, palms open in supplication,
beyond the treeline an orange burning,
a brighter flame filling the sky, a wind darker
than crow, the only tongue between us
being glyphs inscribed in sand, lifted
from the body, unlaced from skin, visible
only to sea and moon, tide erasing
each word before barnacled memory
solidifies the text of departure,
form dissolving into wave.
Out of the wound we come singing a chorus of wings swallowed by daylight.
Hand that balances wind waiting on the surface, out from the creek, free diving, descending from surface warmth, gathering shells, ascending in one long exhalation, leaving the squeeze of depth and coldness behind.
There is a voice in lightless sea, entering through eye, answering voice of shadow buried beneath sternum coiled about spine, always we feel the vibrations in our feet and hands always we feel the wire of edge, the burnished arc of time.
This form has become shadow of cloud, darkening shallows for a moment, turtle grass, blue crabs, bonnethead sharks, ponderous and seeking tongue of horse conch, the sea is indifferent to this body, the multiplicity of forms has buoyed me out past the Key of memory into the open Gulf of sapphire reflected in your eyes.
Surfacing breathless, unfolded
from palms the optic remains unspoken, fronds shimmering with morning, a spent shell lifted from shallows, empty of body, my own emptiness filled with sea restlessly seeking reunification with the greater body an ebb and flow of so many small voices in the roots of mangrove, a clinging of barnacles to our mothering wood, leaves of voices lifting to azure, a different blue than your eyes reflecting sea and horizon.
from palms the optic remains unspoken, fronds shimmering with morning, a spent shell lifted from shallows, empty of body, my own emptiness filled with sea restlessly seeking reunification with the greater body an ebb and flow of so many small voices in the roots of mangrove, a clinging of barnacles to our mothering wood, leaves of voices lifting to azure, a different blue than your eyes reflecting sea and horizon.
Ground grows up through us voice fills the wrist, fingers feather wind as it turns leaves reading a text that inches out to branch tip, leaping into flight.
Form is not shape, not the billet split from stave, when you bind these wounds what emerges is not winged lacerations, when you bind these words this form remembers flame, her hands fill with ash of what was not tree.
Pines long for lightning, intimate embrace of sky, rain is memory of sea brought back to tongue of land, the body is ever an uncertainty the form is frail, words hunger for mouth, curled in wet darkness, snug beneath tongue, breathing the light of utterance.
The eye holds horizon in abeyance, wave is a unit of measure for absence, those who return by moonlight hauling the shell up the shelving, past tideline but not quite to sea oats, delivering a message of continuity.
We are as interlocked as mangrove a forest of basketry, canopy of egret and spoonbill, this not a place of deep roots, tide pulls moon over Gulf, respiration of sea, deep breath of azure, clear blue of flame, breathing as cumulus flowers, lightning flowing into wave, so many tomorrows buried above wrack line.
Wind of ash, wind of burning, some live within blade of day some within wing of night, words you leave in a bowl of sky could be sparks, could be stars,what sleeps in the marrow prepares itself to fly, bone riven, phosphorescence spilling from mouth.
Bio: Peach Delphine is a queer poet from Tampa, Florida. Infatuated with what remains of the undeveloped Gulf coast.
