Simon Perchik is an attorney whose poems have appeared in Partisan Review, Forge, Poetry, Osiris, The New Yorker and elsewhere. His most recent collection is The Gibson Poems published by Cholla Needles Arts & Literary Library, 2019. For more information including free e-books and his essay “Magic, Illusion and Other Realities” please visit his website at SimonPerchik.com.
1
More bench than stone
has that scent from ashes
made with wood, painted green
before it should have been
though the grass you stick in your shoes
is new too, knows nothing
except to be closer, warmed
as if it once had arms
is picking up pieces
for later where it’s not so painful
to sweat by dropping things
in the dark and softer.
2
With nothing but head down
you dig your way out
making room arm under arm
the way your cradle was dipped
first in wood then by itself
lifting your hand to be counted
by twos, as yet not missing
and inside a breath still dark
look up to see who comes back.
3
Between their thirst and valleys
you kneel to blanket these dead
with light, air out the stove
weightless and nothing to lean on
–just like that! a small mound
half iron, half opens for rain
driven into the ground, stroked
feeding on faces and edges
though the wood slowly passing by
never stopped being a river
lets you drink smoke
as if once you had two hearts
still listen for an echo, corners
and the emptiness that reaches inside
for eyelids, sawdust and blacker.
4
Side by side as if the moon
carries off those buttons
close together and your coat
dyed black to make it heavier
–you let it fall, lay there
–yes, you were in love
sang to birds, to burials
though it’s the moon
coming back and the darkness
it needs to close the ground
that goes on alone
yes, you couldn’t move.
5
Motionless, on the way out
no longer feels at home
though this single-minded nail
wants the job finished now
wanted a small hole, filled
to silence the song in the picture
in black and white taking her away
holding on –what’s left
will lower the wooden frame
is already caressing the wall
that something happened to
is surrounded by winds and cries
that carry off birds, bent the Earth
and the exhausted nail, by itself
between your fingers and suddenness.
