poems by rachel kellum
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Confluence
The river enters my son
becomes his hair, runs long
behind his ears, over shoulders
enters his sweat, wet raft scent of hugs
lingers on my face and arms
drifts in rooms when he departs
becomes the wisdom of his limbs
his thoughts a paddle turned a fraction
slim-edged deflection of a current that can kill
broad blade, he tunes himself against it
leans into it, slides past deep shadows
sucking underneath giant boulders
hones each edge of his heart, river muscle
a living rudder, minutely responsive
the boat only a boat but more
his joy, that brave buoyance
carries us past ancient reversals, smokers
sleepers, undercuts, widow makers
that stoic face water-cut in canyon wall
a story, a foil to his countenance
eyes sparkling, scouting the line
for Sam
Four Days Past Due
Rhododendrons burst baby pink,
lavender, fuchsia and maroon. Roses too.
Even beet-red peonies snipped short
to fit the fat jar—five cervixes on green stems—
open within hours of being arranged—
like spring—on cue. But the body is not
a simple flower turning to light. A child
is not a scent or fruit. He turns inside his mother,
not the mysterious worm in a jumping bean,
not the wet butterfly finishing his wings,
not the eye inside a closed lid, dreaming
while the muffled world calls and sings
his name to wake, hatch, bloom. He knows
no metaphors, this water being. His mother
is no tree, bush, jar, socket, pod, but a woman
surrounded by flowers, warm inside, abiding,
living in her own time, smiling silently
at the advice of mothers young and old:
try sex, mountain hikes, spicy burritos,
clary sage, birth ball bouncing, castor oil,
masturbation, nipple stimulation,
stairs, curb walks, acupressure points.
She carries on quietly, amused, not the spring
her mother imagines, not the moon on two legs,
but a woman weeding her real garden
of invasive green, pulling ferns, English ivy,
wild raspberries beneath apple trees,
her strong thighs parted, straddling a giant belly.
Scratched, resting, cooled, she spoons
peanut butter onto boats of medjool dates,
savors, swallows, softens in her own way,
embracing, with me, the first and last lesson
of motherhood: be present while you wait.
for Sage
Stalagmite
Dark thoughts drip
Stalactite
Finger, fang, bud
Of child’s first
Top tooth
A dark twin forms
Below
Reaches up
Fills the gap
My heart
God’s finger finally
Touches Eve’s
Coyote takes her first bite
Hungry infant bleeds
Mother’s breast
Sand Burial
Before tractors buried my father
who would have loved to watch the work
of those machines, earthmovers, like himself—
the way good men pulled levers to lift his vault lid,
suspended like a Frank Lloyd Wright cantilever
hovering over the eternal balcony of death,
that bardo where inside marries outside,
and lowered one end perfectly above him
until one lip slipped into the vault’s rim
and made the opposite end quaver
(That’s how you know male meets female,
the undertaker said with pride in his men,
artists, he called them, for knowing
the subtle arts of the trade: See, that’s when
they know the concrete seam will seal, their signal
to lower the lid the rest of the way)—
I stood with Sam in his grandpa’s Quicksilver cap,
grey hairs and spiced sweat still in the band,
threw fistfuls of Utah sand into the hole
then shovelfuls, to finally let his chronic absence go,
resurrecting now the memory of that day my father
fished small grains of Illinois sand from my red eyes
with tissue he had wadded to a point,
that tenderness, the lingering sting.
two pruning haiku
dusty pungent stalks
last year’s crop of Russian sage
fall to my quick blades
* * * * *
sneeze, gather white twigs
living ten of wands woman
my burden is light
Fluxus Score: Instructions for a Couple Over Unknown Duration
1.
Observe his plate of tater tots
while you wait to pray.
Listen to his heavy stream across the house
the water course through pipes
his feet return, full of him. Pray.
2.
Sit in silent witness
of creosote collecting
on the wood stove pane.
Take turns placing your palm
on each other’s thigh.
3.
Nearly halfway
through duration
begin cold plunging.
Gasp together until
a calm carries.
3.
Giggle and kiss each other once again
just to upset the whimpering dog
who wants a kiss goodbye, too
every morning, not jealous of him
but you who gets his first kiss.
4.
Each of you, nearly alternately
lay a log on the fire when coals begin
to die, open the flue until flames rise.
Keep each other warm like this
until your last winter.
5.
Notice when the other
makes the bed, sweeps
cooks, waters seeds
takes out trash.
Say something.
6.
Moan into each other’s ears.
7.
Walk the short loop,
the mid loop, the long loop
for as long as the dog lives.
Notice together or alone
the walk takes you home.
Eclipse ‘24, for Grey, 24
He has sought
the path of totality,
my son.
He has built
an infrastructure
to worship it,
laid down ropes of power
for the festival.
He will stand beneath
the darkened sun
whole.
He knows now,
it doesn’t last long.
I know now,
he will come home.
A raven will shout
something dark
about awe.
Sacred Masculine, 2023, collage, Rachel Kellum
Crossing Tacoma Bridges with My Pregnant Daughter
I notice moss in the cracks of the peeling white footbridge.
Its wooden arms reach across the tracks of trains
that crawl through the belly of Titlow Park. We stop,
hands on the railing, look down, look into the woods
where tracks disappear, look through foliage to the Sound.
Days later, on another walk over Narrows Bridge, I notice twin
crisscross symmetries of early metal towers perched on piers
mirroring newer concrete ones; sage green suspension cables—
sloped, parallel, curving pipes she says her family of firefighters
climb, clipped into handrails, to the tops of tower saddles
where they rappel to the Sound to practice emergency
rescue. It is my privilege to notice only moss and eras
of architecture after a bridge has collapsed, to feel my nerves
jolt with the thought of her precarious ascents and descents.
Beneath, or perhaps, transparently overlaid like thin skin
upon these rare moments of our togetherness, my daughter
also sees bodies leapt upon tracks, a beloved, sad dispatcher
scattered by a train, crushed women and men floating
on the Sound that rushed up like pure despair, that liquid body
like unforgiving, then forgiving, concrete. Every so many yards,
a sign is posted on the bridge that makes a promise:
“There is always hope,” followed by a number to call
that ends with TALK. We don’t. Standing there, suspended,
we span memories of a bullet hole in a wooden floor,
a hoodie pulled up to spare our eyes a rope burned neck.
We take in the view of the ragged, verdant shore, our ears
lashed by traffic’s knives. She says, “I can still hear the frogs….
Listen, what is that called?” Susurrus, I say. We pause. Listen.
“Through the Woods,” by Jason Abington
photo by Carson Diaz