If suddenly

BY ANU LAKHAN
If suddenly she rears
pulls, pitches
into the lightning

if the split sky strikes

splinters the glassy ground
(her stride is a circle growing smaller)

when she sees the stars

—all skies have storms
and she has seen them

if she shies and starts

when she skids
when she lowers her eyes
if she stops to listen:

nervous rider, beware.

Look to the New Moon

BY MAI DER VANG

If you must hear the story

of my turbulent gaze after waking,

the march of my hours to hermit

into a higher body, it is that

whatever you put into the Universe

eventually returns.

In our oneness of gift,

we are eyes together,

nerves together, affected together.

If I’ve never told you

how madly we share in the stars,

how it was all founded for you,

then let the longing for Arcturus

be the gilding of our sleep.

I know when your time was in its

making, I was left to sing alone,

unfed to trample through a hundred

layers of night without a heart

to hold my guard.

If I had known all those days

to listen deep into myself so that you

would begin to hear me, I’d sooner

soak the decibels of your cells

into the exhale of my embrace.

A scorning within is within
Source: Poetry (July/August 2019)
coming back to scorn.
A rose quartz promise lifted into

the world is the world coming back

to surrender its love.

Even after I took my health

into a vineyard of hawks,

I could not break myself from caring

but only to seek you, find you,

whisper into your palm:

you are not lost, you won’t be lost.