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James Hoch

Closure

[View as PDF/Issuu]

In the oldest stories, a snake eats its tail,
a savage peeks his head out of a socket
of ruin, a boat returns with no crew,
and death makes us back into ether.
There seems no room for other versions.
A couple in the middle of rush hour
step out of their car and leap off a bridge,
only to hit a catwalk a few feet below.
And in the abrupt joy, when they crack
a heap of ribs, dodge the arc of tragedy,
they turn, laugh, then nudge each other
over the side. This time they congrue.
They become what we expect. Love,
shouldn’t we achieve a thing as clean?
In our garden of unfinished beds,
half-believing the half-empty,
it looks like we’re falling together;
it looks like we’re treading water.

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Cover art by Ralph Lazar

Volume 41, Number 4

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Writer’s Notebook

Writer’s Notebook—Field Dress Portal

Sarah Audsley

Writer’s Notebook—Field Dress Portal

Writing this poem was not a commentary on a rivalry between the sister arts—poetry and painting—but more an experiment in the ekphrastic poetic mode.

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