4 POEMS
Cate Peebles
OUT OF OFFICE REPLY
I will be away
from here I
will not reply
to your note not
ever not once
at all but please freely
wonder where I am
sitting or sprawled
askew in beachy rain
at opposite poles
my lolling head
an abandoned
dreamland amusement
park I am gone
somewhere into deep
woods a feral golden
retriever do not expect
a response I am
lying in red leaves
in a pink rain-
coat or waiting
in spider webs for green
swamp things to
cure my brain
of meeting minutes
and retention policies
the horror
as snakes clog my
inbox with loose
eggs dribbling
notifications
through a mango candy
straw into my ears
most urgent cat calls
however, my immediate attention
is now merengue
I thank you
for your
continued
patience
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PYTHON A L'ORANGE
| It was my understanding the fox had buried herself/ for the night/ her scent/ a winding trail/ above the trail itself/ and the hounds had surrendered to the hall/ half asleep with worry/ their muzzles drenched in lemon zest/ the ladies dismounted without complaint/ but the gentlemen lingered/ wondering whether they had any meat left in their skulls/ any hearts to emblazon later upon their chests/ good thing the heat gave way to showers/ good thing the almighty ruin of ignored truths feathered/ the scene as serpents fomenting orange warnings/ from beneath the patio/ put yourself in a quiet mood/ hum a tune reminiscent of pythons boiling/ it's not too late to do something with the rattle dee |
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SELF-PORTRAIT AS A PAINTBRUSH
| Counting breath until/ enlightenment drizzles the upper lip/ there's no pasture like the one that never exists/ what do you know/ about seeing/ my insights are bridled horses/ bits chomped/ foam frothing from a sleek dappled coat/ the artist knew/ to get a perfect line of sinew under skin/ she cut and peeled the surface back/ plucked follicles to find/ exactly where the heart blanched/ she had to count/ the veins inside-out/ find their connections and a confluence/ to paint a placid broodmare's coat/ sunning/ a cool summer morning/ crack its eye open with a scalpel/ to see the crescent moon/ rise above the churchyard/ the shadow of a fox runs loose in her blood/ did you climb inside the horse's hide/ did you yell/ all foggy morning until the rain came? deee |
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SEARCHING FOR SKYLIGHT
| The database collects itself/ a forest of numb numbers articulating a galaxy /gone discrete/ how I try to ask the right questions/ but find formulas burn/ like vitamins stuck dissolving mid-throat/ I ask for the specifics of/ window on sun/ & nothing comes/ I ask for an index/ of every time your eye falls/ into the grass & bounces/ back to the path/ the bridge/ the highway/ in ascending then descending order/ so many times/ the table replies/ too many combinations/ try again/ I place my questions in the correct field/ I quantify cloud cover/ times the length of your legs/ around me pulled tight/ an acceptable cell/ all solution/ a still place to breathe, a luxury/ arrived at accidentally/ but infinite search engines surround us with whirring/ & blurred replies/ what Boolean satisfaction/ can be found emerging from stainless/ steel lozenges &/or vertical rivers of precast concrete?/ how notably oak domes filter ultraviolet ceilings/ collect unseen mechanical air vents/ where we become so aware of the weight/ our feet carry/ the imbalance of one step/ versus the next/ carried over/ if I take an atom from this wild/ lily & put it in an empty blue eggshell/ what appears after a night of lightning/ a grid reported missing &/ its trail of queries go fast/ back to the cloud/ they most wish to be |
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About these poems: Each of the poems here was in some way conceived in an archives: searching a database of architectural drawings, onion skin office memos from the 1960s, Andy Warhol's novelty plate collection, receipts for the purchase of 18th-century equestrian paintings. In my daily work as an archivist, I am drawn to mundanities: the lists, typos, bureaucratic exasperation, and ephemeral notes to self—because they offer a medium through which time travel is possible, a seance of sorts; attempts to dip into and through linear time like stitches. Susan Howe's [Spontaneous Particulars: The Telepathy of Archives] is a singular testament to this [phenomenon].