12.1 (Fall 2007) | The 2River View | Authors Poems PDF Archives 2River |
Above the Baby’s Grave
Were you arboreal | In memory |
before you landed | Mildred Phillips, born |
or just caught | in 1910: died |
in the net of | 1912: darling we miss thee |
heavens— | |
I think of you often | Moss in the folds |
in the trees | winged angel—her parents dead but |
still a baby, still | two decades later— |
with the full ruddy | crown of the head |
limbs of Michelangelo's | polished smooth |
Christ: for aren't you | like her birth |
above me now | this opening |
crossing into | arching above |
a mimosa as here | the trees, runged around that |
I weep by your | |
grave—aren't you | lost |
every absence in me | infant |
made flesh— | core |
Demeter Rising From the Couch
The way I heard it | She rises |
a field, brown-eyed | and goes to |
susans: a child | the mirror— |
in the field, and then | hollow-eyed, waiting for |
the rape, the taking down | sounds: |
to that place: The way | the door, |
I feared it was the fall | parting car, |
of the spirit | shoes off— |
the browning of the eye, | all arrangements |
the girl's entrapment | of modern-day |
in the underworld | custody |
Too old to identify | She rises |
with Persephone, | to see how |
I understand | her daughter will weather |
Demeter's wintering— | the visit: |
split from her child almost | curling tight |
half of the time | a little shell |
powerless in that hollow- | hiding or the nameless |
eyed stare | anger flaming |
back | up in her |
Copyright 2River. Please do not use or reproduce without permission.