I do not know,
only that the panther
stalking me from the mountains
is here in all his darkness.

My path jagged with rocks
is fire under my feet.

There is no shelter,
only vines for my throat,
branches for my face,
thorns for my skin.

I do not know how I arrived,
only that I trusted too much
the weight of gold,
safety of numbers,
advice of strangers.

Whose woods these are
I do not know,
only that the panther
stalking me from the mountains
is here in all

Spring comes in March in triplicate hues,
Pink purple lilac, the color of gray
Women’s scarves, variable shades of magnolia
Afloat on branches or petals loose
On grass. I tie up my sneakers—over
Sixty, out for my morning walk, a Dorothy
To eye more months. In June and July
The year will be blue jacaranda
Lining Cathedral Oaks, blue hydrangea
Swollen fat, drenched wet from circling sprays.
Today the vibrant peach buds poke
Open, vulgar as those she’s embroidered
In the years

Martin Alexander

In Grandma’s house when we arrived on leave
the grand piano yawned and woke from two years’ sleep
and bared its gleaming teeth – black-gapped and white –
sprawled out, a friendly beast across the sunny parlour floor.

There was a box of sandstone bricks
for building castles by the fire. We had a
satisfying way of making thunder for our cannon
with a fist of lower keys until the staircase thundered too
with Mummy’s tread: “Don’t touch it!” and we

When I imagine my mother’s body, spectral
questions float: how the cage
of bone protects the heart, how she sounded
near death once or if bird cried
a song near the river.  I imagine it like gel
in a body of water, a jellyfish in the sea,
a gasping squid.

                      If I could touch the body,
I would go for the neck
where air meets air, despair swapped for light
flashes, cusps of cut lavender,
cups of the silkworms you may have loved,
the new

The moon is a wide-eyed owl,
eavesdropping at our every word,
gazing at us while we walk naked
reliving our days in the womb
where the world is all water, wind and fire.
Our shadows are amphibians
thriving among sands, pebbles, and waves.
The night is warm like blood and breath.
Our silence reverberates in the wind.
We are a testament to Eden’s total mystery:
am I broken from your ribs
or are you broken from mine?
I know of no science nor theology
to tell why our whispers