Page 34 - the NOISE March 2016

CALLIE LUEDEKER
FOSSIL OCEANS DREAMING
I swim through the forest, measuring the circumference of eternity,
deep under the waves brachiopods and brytozoa lurking in the gloom
and dappled shadow.
I touch the seas,
they turn to stone,
then shells
emerge from the earth
when the skies burst forth with the tears of the ocean upon the bones of the dead.
| Vladimir Erimou
KAIROBASIS
You came in the dawn
like thunder out of blue sky
and I stood rooted
to the ground
like an ancient juniper,
gnarly bark, all coated with moss
with the night blowing all around me.
The road crested the Rim,
like fire and smoke upon
ancient moon-dappled tropical seas
of the mind,
filled with sharks lurking in the gloom, frenzied feeding upon worries and fears while the tires thrummed on the pavement endlessly onwards
into the past and future
out beyond the ninth wave,
down into the valley,
sprinkled with stars.
I wonder if the voice
which once whispered upon the mountain summit so long ago
while I sat in prayer
spoke True Words.
I hope so;
I feel I’m finally
old enough for fairy tales once again.
| Vladimir Erimou
POSSESSION
Two winters ago I would white-knuckle my desk, attempting not to fly home
every time I scratched my beard, catching you again on my fingers, in the hairs
around my mouth, beneath my nose.
You and the warm smell of the radiator and the special blend coffee when I entered. You undressed like
the snow of the television and
the opened window. Butternut squash with cinnamon in the little stove soon to be thick soup
that would lie as still as you, anticipating
the kill, caught in the electric-bright purring
up from your perfect feet
and never fully painted toes to the back of your knees, wetting down that crook, that valley where
your scent could never hide. The long sojourn
to that Eden between your big ears
and the fine dining at the back
of your jaw.
And then I would turn you over, search
for you again in your throat, your cotton stomach, finally finding you in the December light
that clung like static to the tiny blond hairs
of your inner-thighs.
With saliva and deep-throated blasphemies
I would cast you into me.
And now winter’s coming again, implacable, and I have neither the tools nor the time to set your ghost free.
In the sharp frozen night you would bury your face in my armpit, sleep there after whispering
that you loved my smell, one leg over mine,
hand twiddling my chest hairs,
shaping out my heart.
| Jason Cassella
34 • MARCH 2016 • the NOISE arts & news • thenoise.us