Three Poems

 

New Year

There was nothing in that drawer
except for what we would put there.

Neither of us were collectors
but I had a fascination with hearts. 

The many tubes of inletting and out-
letting—the round aorta done up

like a bun in your hair. Yours was
the only one I captured. I remember

how you handed it to me, on a cold 
slab of a morning, purple and throbbing.

14 degrees was planned for the evening.
I left with my boots on, carrying

a darkly stained paper bag, held out 
like a lantern. All day I walked

through streets and up stairs, shouldering
a part of your body that you entrusted

to me. I did not mean to be greedy
when I returned home and asked to feel

the light your body gave off under the moon.
It had been so cold that my fingers

broke off like small twigs. We placed them
in the empty drawer, and as we closed it,

they echoed as if reanimated with good news.

Narcissus Papyrus

When I read the poem about paper whites
I confused it with a money plant
having just emailed you about the credit card

Subject: $ Paid off! All I could do
was think to celebrate, so I charged
a sixpack, and we drank it as you taught me 

the difference between a paper white and
an annual honesty. I’m not a gardener
but I cultivate. You do your thing, I do

mine and together we shared our own
truths. The suffering I caused bitching
about our debt, and how I wasn’t sure

where to hang my anxiety. Holy Christmas
being over, dead trees line the streets
and spill out of dumpsters which means I’m 

no longer freezing my ass off with a smile just
freezing my ass off. I thought it would be good
to see something sprout, so today I went to

the flower shop with the pink orchid in the window,
which I know I would kill, and instead walked out
with a bundle of cut flowers all thorny stemmed & full

of prickers. Something to put a one-sided smile on
your face as you forked the leftovers into your mouth
saying through the mashed potatoes Isn’t that just like you.

Event Horizon

It’s Wednesday again
            and the week is half in
                        the bag from which I pull
a tangerine for my two sons, 
            the fruit that looks like a star 
                        inside, my joke is all we eat
is processed sunlight but no matter 
            what I say or do the world
                        is always left hanging
in the balance even though
            there are moments when looking
                        at small fingers learning
to balance a sphere
            I feel a mortality in me
                        that will not die. Like the time
someone said that star we look upon
            is trying to kill us
                        only I always trust
what allows me to
            see, though we have passed the point
                        of no return, before the fruit
was on the vine, before
            the chlorofluorocarbon’s sweet ethereal
                        odor was born and then
barred. I’m not thinking
            of the children when I jot
                        down my fears. All fear is
is writing and all writing
            a form of fear. Don’t
                        twist too clever a phrase
you’re not shaping the world
            in anyone’s image and there are
                        nitrogen particles
that would sooner kill you
            than make you stronger. So build
                        a good, hot fire and read
a radioactive comic book because
            it’s Wednesday, my night alone
                        with the kids and the darkness
is coming on outside, a stipple
            of light, let’s call it tangerine.
                        Not yours. Not mine. The children’s
hands are coming together
            inconsistently shouting for more
                        of what I can give
I will give them
            what I can give


Douglas Korb is the author of the prize-winning chapbook The Cut Worm, and his poems have appeared in several magazines such as NOӦ Journal, Fifth Wednesday Journal, Tupelo Quarterly, Hobart, Versal, Barrelhouse, Spork, Redactions, RHINO, Poet Lore, and elsewhere. He is currently on the board of directors for the Collected Poets Series in Shelburne Falls, MA. His erasure art and other work can be found online at brokarthere.wordpress.com.

 
poetry, 2015SLMDouglas Korb