the enso

"Yearning" by marlowe

the poem

1.
When the fog lifts, the world
is just as it was. Our lives are
plotted in grids and circles,
yet we continue to unwind
a ball of yarn into a straight line
which we then bend to our will.
Yes, blood is easily spilled, like wine
splashing from the glasses of careless drinkers
entranced by their revelry. The intention
we manifest as we walk our chosen path
is the moon that governs us, commanding
whether the tide ebbs or surges.

2.
See? The squirrel’s tail
is like a feather duster
but the tail of a skunk is a flag
that should not be ignored.
You tell me that to make something whole
sometimes it must be broken first.
This orange rind twists like a double helix.
Our kitchen curtains are veils that thinly separate
our constructions. Letters and numbers,
compiled into words and phrases, are doorways,
and not all that sparkles is fool’s gold.

3.
You wrap your fingers around your mug
like the tentacles of an octopus.
An owl’s hoot cleaves the darkness
while our two dogs curl asleep: yin and yang.

4.
Remember how each lemon was a sun?
The red dwarf maple tree was a torch,
the hay bales were thimbles in the fields,
and the weave of the basket
looked like a raspberry.
Now we watch a flock of seagulls flutter
on the wind like confetti.
Driving home, we are flanked
by dried crops of cotton, awkward bundles
of copper wire lined in stiff rows.
Yet the hibiscus opens like radar dish.

the enso

"Man-made Glaciers" by marlowe

the compilation

The rain ricochets off your car door, the concrete, like bullets
being fired from the sky, each raindrop is a microcosm,
while the clouds are spread, bumpy, like butter icing on a cake.
Each city looks like a star splattered against this topography,
its light scattered from the force of impact, gleaming
through a galaxy of galleries, a milky way of strip mall sprawl
offering promises it cannot keep. The glow of the street lamp glistens
in this drizzle, each strand of light like a spider’s silky line wet with dew.
You suspect everything is man-made:
the glacier in the adjacent lake is a water ski ramp, for instance.
As the calm surface of the pho broth mirrors your face,
chopsticks in hand – probing for the last noodle is like fishing
in your subconscious – you vibrate like a struck string,
singing your note while the patterns on your paisley shirt swirl
like a Rorschach test. You know dawn taunts us
to begin anew: it begs, see what can happen, it insists, yes,
embrace this illusion woven as bright as the rising sun.
Outside, black-eyed susans stand tall amid wild purple thistles,
luxury amid the raw beauty of utility,
and the blue mophead hydrangeas tease you like carnival snow cones.
You remember how
the clustered arms of the saguaro extend
like the towers of a Gaudi cathedral,
how the horns of a ram curve into a sacred omega.