Scrutiny

The sorrow quotient settles in a deeper register
of knowing, a bog of drunken insight and cat eyes.
It was said of the first poet I loved and recognized
that he lacked the rooted normality of a major voice
and this makes a new kind of sense to me now.
What rough vocation demands such strident use
of sick days to repair the broken levees of a fool
soul bent on protecting the unlooked-for
where sky and ground roar a running river
to spell variations in chorus on the page?
This silence for want of better words
only lives by careful collections of foragers
on shores who number shells on shelves
and bird feathers by weathered tendrils
of larger limbs. The thin page.
The shaking hand.

Author: Stacey C. Johnson

I keep watch and listen, mostly in dark places. View all posts by Stacey C. Johnson