I remember the first look you gave me.
It was a sidelong nod of regret, bending like reeds
under the
sudden breeze
of
departing flocks of cranes.
Your hello, I... cracked like a Mimbres pot
dropped by an Indian boy running through willows
on the Gilas
banks
to
grab silver tails of flight.
Fly! Trying, you spun in the wingbeats of lovers
whose tempest of poems struck canyon walls
as they skipped
their words
down
your rivers gorge.
Waves spread in rings from loves skimming toes,
splashing beads on your neck. You tripped, pitched by an uplift.
A deep shard
of longing
lodged
in your look.
As I reach to pull it out, feathers sprout from my arms.
Rising from the banks, I take the form of a single crane dancing,
wings outstretched,
lured
by my own reflection.
The second time I passed you, I could not see your face.
Your eyes looked down,
the ache,
if there,
communed
with a menu.
Yet your long legs slid away from the bench
like water skiis cresting a wake.
I almost tripped
over them
spilling
tossed salad.
Instead I flew into the loose mist-net of the second look
you caught me in. Snagged by irises
stabbed with
suns,
I
fell inside your gaze.
But, was reminded of streaks on the pounding breast
of a yellow warbler blown off-course
by hurricane
winds
on
the Gulf. It landed
half-dead in my fathers hand somewhere in the Atlantic.
I wanted to softly blow the gilt
feathers apart
to
warm your heart within.
The third time I saw you, you tacked toward me
on the tide and breeze of the church's
congregation,
rolled your eyes,
and
strummed.
It was Father's Day. You sang a Portuguese ballad
about a sailor who drowned,
before his
daughter
could
reach him by sundown.
I cant remember the lyrics or tune, but the look on your face
made my pulses dash. I thought of my father's
ham radio
set,
how
his fingers turned knobs,
and tapped, tapped, tapped to foreign ships all night.
As I watched from bed, sailors sick for their homeland
blinked lights
back
at my father.
Snapping the sheets my father raised, your gusts of song
blew through me, splashing the deck
with my father's
waves,
churning
morse code all through me.
From the shores of my heart, a crane took flight, flashing
its sunlight of wings on my father. Riding ripples
your singing
waked,
I
sailed where his ash blew
and
found him.
Deborah Finch was born in San Jose, California and now lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico with her husband and daughter. She received her Bachelors degree in Wildlife Management from Humboldt State University, California and her doctorate in Zoology from University of Wyoming. Deborah makes her living as a research biologist and technical writer for the U.S. Forest Service. Her poetry has been published in a variety of online and hard print journals including Arizona Writer and Photographer, Field and Forest, Moongate Internationale, Owen Wister Review, The Rag, Santa Fe Poetry Broadside, Tapestry, and 2River View. Deborah is a Unitarian Universalist whose spiritual beliefs are frequently reflected in her poems.
In this issue:
Esther Altshul Helfgott : Michelle
Cameron : Alison Daniel : Deborah
Finch : Jean Frances :
Fiona Robyn : Elisabeth
Spinks : Sandy Steinman : Tasha
: Tilotamma : Georgie
Young