Crone: Raising the Dead

                              for Mary

1.

When I no longer waited for the promised resurrection:

the lighted tunnel or the brutal ways of brutal men.

When I no longer listened to the grinding proclamations

of conveyer belts or looked for murderers or dragonflies

in my rearview mirror. When I no longer spoke in corporate

rhymes of rightsizing, human capital, the ballooning

of things never meant to float. When I no longer flattened

my body beneath engines or dripping machines. I learned

that oil looks like blood in black & white memories: it tastes

like wine when you’ve thirsted for days. I learned a hollow

box is the only shape that can explain death’s vibratory

light. I learned that circles do not bounce or sing or end

or begin. I learned that rewinding is a cruel & simple lie.

2.

Last night you dreamed of your first lover, and I dreamed

of my last while the blue moon dripped like rosemary oil

into the midnight ocean. B. told you that he had been alive

all along. His obituary a cruel love note to inspire a song

in your neglectful throat: your thoughtless refusal to rewind.

D. was as thin as a matchstick desperate to become flame.

The blue moon crawled beneath our doors: the blue moon

flowered inside our sleeping mouths & I asked why did you

marry someone with my name? He said he wanted one thing

to stay the same. When you asked B. Where have you been all

this time? I knew that he was coiled in the tangle of blackberry

vines, the first & last blush of lovers, the tiny hidden pocket

inside your winter coat. We woke to the blue house shaking.

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Beth Gordon

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POETRY

Beth Gordon is a poet, mother and grandmother currently living in Asheville, NC. She is the author of several chapbooks including The Water Cycle (Variant Literature) and How to Keep Things Alive (Split Rock Press, forthcoming October 2023). Her poems have been published in Poet Lore, Citron Review, SWWIM, Pithead Chapel, Moist Poetry, Okay Donkey and others. Beth is Managing Editor of Feral: A Journal of Poetry and Art, Assistant Editor of Animal Heart Press, and Grandma of Femme Salve Books. Twitter Instagram, and BlueSky @bethgordonpoet. and elsewhere. Connect on Twitter at @Lukesrant or through email: [email protected]..

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