The Mind This Morning

 

Play a little
lime-game with me

Your lake-face flashes
like a shelf
cleaned by the sweep
of an arm

Crash! Don’t own
a broom
We collect
dust to collage
the dock

There is hair in
the lake-roof there

Someone watches
from behind a tree
like a water-clock

We exist before
sex
We float the rinds
in a bucket
I am a matchstick
mast

The source of joy
is the instinct for joy

When we play
the faster we spin
trees    mother   trees  mother
treesmothertrees

 

 

*

 

 

The Raising

 

I know your mountain
It’s flagless

Laced with roots
Berry-laden
Your face, oily burlap

Ash on the envelope
To shake off or tuck in

Lakes, turn to me

Tumorless
I hold the water

 

 

*

 

 

Your Hasty Answer to Light

 

Horizon’s drama
a vestige

Why does it slant pictorial?

Particular dark
a flighty bulb

I’m part-time liquid

Deficit of the pear
behind the ear

I made a motion, a motor
& a car cries back

crossing out
the strain of light

Behind-behind
the liquid

 

 

 

Julia Cohen is the author of Triggermoon Triggermoon and two forthcoming collections. Her work appears in journals like Colorado Review, DIAGRAM, New American Writing, and Kenyon Review Online. You can find her at www.OnTheMessierSideOfNeat.blogspot.com

 

 

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