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TWENTY YEARS
APART
The light of our arms distresses us
as it flings itself away from its sleeves.
I remember cows in a field of blue maize,
their faces
dancing the cow wedding dance.
Some fragments of springtime bred in the
shade
of a night fisherman, whistling.
I remember the smile of a grey wagon at
dusk
as it did nothing among the wildflowers.
All over the island, lamps came on like
jars
with old men inside them, lighting their
pipes.
I remember how we sat on a stump above
the harbor
naming the heavens, letting our own names
go.
--Christopher Howell
Copyright © 2008 by Oberlin College.
May not be reproduced without permission.
POEM
TALKING IN ITS SLEEP ABOUT A LAKE
The year Jeffrey's Shooting Star filled
the marshland
of Mowich Lake with chaos, white bands
around the tube of each purple blossom
called
hello there I say hello there please walk
around me as they clustered inside-out.
The long
filament tube, reflexed petals (usually five),
sticky anthers promising generations into
infinitude
of Jeffreys. Your leaving is not easy
on the world. When I press tent stakes, when
I boil a mug of water, when I sit and stare:
no deer this evening, no tail twitching
the bear grass, no snorting at the lake;
my mind will not allow that flower to leave
the marshland but it has. I tried not to
say
these words, but here they come: no remission,
no treatment, no telling the kids, quiet,
dear,
go back to sleep. The year was 2002,
I think,
and
Jeffrey's Shooting Star let loose in my mind.
Every sticky anther extended toward the
stigma.
--Lilah Hegnauer
Copyright © 2008 by Oberlin College.
May not be reproduced without permission.
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