Alicia Mathias (Western Voices 2020)

Exclusive: Western Voices, 2020: Edited by Scott Thomas Outlar

Bio: Alicia Mathias is a poet, singer and photographer. She is appreciative that her poems appear in: Ann Arbor Review, January Review Journal, Unlikely Stories, The Bitter Oleander, and Clockwise Cat. She has work forthcoming in: The Canopy Review, and elsewhere. Alicia writes in New York, with Zeppelin the Wonder Cat, by her side. Warmest wishes to all!

POETRY IN THE CLOUDS

John Keats
and Fanny Brawne
finally
reunite

His arm around
her shoulder
as she rests
upon his ribs

Harps of two
dozen
un-plucked
couplets

Beginning
to reverb
with lovers
coasting

They scatter
waves
of almandine
sun

Breathe
the setting
to gold scrolled
glow

And bask

in the coming

days

of butterflies

“The Waiting (is the hardest part)”
                                                                                                for Tom Petty

Our well
 loved
Birch
 was once
forced
 over
by heavy
 ice
storms
 that fractured
his neck
 crunched
over
 hunched
to the ground
 for two long
Springs

till his spine
finally
realigned

as I soothed him singing
from Hard Promises

 i'd slide
poems
 ‘round his waist
with space
 to comfort
him with hushes

then one day
 as I ran out
  of breath
   and up
    our steps
           i paused
           aware

of late winter
down
shifting

our Birch
 was springing
  up
    closer
        to
          sky
            nearly
          all the way
       right
      relieved
      and
          appeared

                    to be

                                                    tossing

                                            back
                      his long hair

     laughing

[LIVE BAIT]

jangle
of spare change
slides
from atop
my dresser
leaps
into my pocket
slippery
hands filled
with shimmer

(waves
cupped)

flung into summer
air
then caught;
hundreds
of tiny
glimmers--
minnows

i open my Ziploc bag
drop a loud wave
into its
mouth

i see sand
pebbles and water
with kaleidoscopic
streaks

[a sample of silver fish]

i watch them
for a while
aches of rain
bows
flapping

[it’s too small a space to swim]

no kind of life—
so i release them
returning to their homes
becoming opals
sequined surf
giggling lit

the sun sets
across from the creek
where i see
a dispenser sells
LIVE BAIT for 25¢

(and as i reach into my pocket)

can you hear the twinkles
    and plinks
sifting
   as they whoosh
       down
   the throat
          of metal
pressed clinked clanked hooked
     and unleashed
                        as
                 they
                        tumble
                  into

                       my

              waiting
                          palms           

                        wriggling

Setu, April 2020