Skip to main content

AG Compaine :: Three poems

 

 


Grief Work

Crows circle in a murder, caw to mourn their dead,
rifling this ordinary corner, gunning for the culprit. 

I lie back on a new webbed lounger.
These are the waning days of summer, 

season of solace. Black birds smaller and higher
than I remember. Neither placated nor gracious, 

not the type to gather quietly ‘round
a survivors’ table, their keening unnerves me, 

like outrage I can’t muster. Cruelty’s
bred and braided, knows no surfeit-- 

crows darken their line of flight, scribble
in black crayon, mark the perimeter 

of this crime scene. It’s instinct. We know
the pitch and tempo of such harrowing. 

Why?, they cry. Why not? Even so,
sorrow’s raw, bearing down, 

this racket won’t be mistaken. Behind me,
a bowl, rugged, unsettled. No one would dare 

build there. I still learn to scout the limits
of my own safe standing. Closer now, 

fear seeps. Audacious cries that dare
not drive away the comfort we crave. 

What’s savage defies plans, hard-earned,
or magical. Compromises I once wished  

would protect me... until I bargained away  
hope. Sorrow spreads wildly, 

any beasts’.

 

 

 

The Crossing

 

As the days shorten, I consider my own pardon
Ready myself to drape in the full weave 

Of sorrow passed down, now refashioned. Blood’s
Warmth, the full account. Only now I see  

How grace shows up. At first, a suggestion-
Antlers dart from the side brush to the right 

In my periphery. Then the full view
Just beyond my windshield. A buck midway, 

A fawn follows. He turns his eyes, fixes
My gaze, finds a fitting stride. Not 

Rushed. (More like a crossing guard
Who ushers school kids) across 

A stretch of two-lane
He’s cleared space for us. Ellipsis 

That orders the sequence of passing. Time
Refolds. Pulses sync in the pause. 

 

Lines of Flight 

1.
The sweet of lush fall ferments in underbrush and pale blue seeps
through gaps in a backlit topography of cloud. Fair day in flux.

This tender exposition. Silken sorrow hovers beneath my sternum,
though the wind has died down. I hush my approach 

once off the street, head toward the edge of the pond, no expert
at hiding. To my left, marsh grass, the kerfuffle of wings unfurling 

as he takes flight. Great blue heron- churlish rush- protecting
his privacy. Never catch him off-guard. Yet,his take-off is show 

enough: wide outstretch of wings, neck tucked to chest, dangling
stick feet taking long seconds to retract as a plane’s wheels 

off the runway. He’s airborne, despite an ungainly start,
gliding just above the gleaming pond skin, headed 

for some solitary perch on the small island at the far side
shore, trained, as he is, to fly low to nab fish. Lone majesty 

here on my account. I’ve been buried before in the screams
of my inflamed tissue. Not today. Here, to tell 

of holy time. Slowed passage. Not numb, not raging,
no race from this wracked body. The deep ache, 

the unbridled grief of a young boy with no words 

for terror. On the verge, like the great
bird, I’ve new quiet to find. Sighted, free 

of my own desolation, I’ve never dared...
What if I can’t cash-in on the approval   

I’ve spent my life accruing? To rely
on my own estimation. Cast off accusation, 

the smacking hand of a child’s warden
in whose line I’ve stood for check-out.

As if she knew my price per pound. She told me
I’m self-deluded. Weighed me, armed and aimed 

each time to take me down, debit my account
Why would I participate, child raised on discount?
 

2.
Back home, I prepare my perch: a new easy chair,
in my den upstairs, where light dapples walls painted

robin-egg blue. These days, I write in dormers,
under eaves that enfold me in their soft angles. 

Here to unpack what I saw, the horror and the surfeit
none of us deserve. I’d gone to catch a glimpse 

of a great bird. Even so, unsated. I missed  
the disarming white- the egrets who grace    

my daily return, atop stones I’ve come to know.
I couldn’t piece it: how they were the ones who  

circled high above my head, as I came to water’s
edge. Their convocation headed westward: resolved, 

without remorse. I won’t ever mistake them again 
for gulls: the way their long necks lead, the slim tube 

of their bodies stretched, the unhurried
sweep of their wings. Like me, they’re called,  

who knows where. Universe expanding, too
vast, too fast. Eons will shine again tonight   

as I gaze up to find Orion’s Belt. Light sent to me
millions of years ago. Ready now to draw my own 

star map, early fall’s constellations in a northern sky
Note them. Date them. Before the heavens change.

 

 

 

AG Compaine is a psychotherapist, a psychiatrist by training, who works with adults who have histories of childhood abuse. e has read and written poetry for 25 years but last sent out his work in the late ‘90’s when e had a few poems published in journals such as Slipstream. Meanwhile, AG and eis husband are in the first generation of queer men to raise a daughter together. She has just started her undergraduate studies at Yale. During the pandemic, AG moved to a coastal town in southern Rhode Island, and e has been sharing work and workshopping with a college friend who is a poet and writing professor.

Popular posts from this blog

submissions :: where is the river

Up to six poems in a single .doc file with author biography and photo to kieferjdlogan@gmail.com All rights revert to the author/s upon publication.

issue twenty-seven :: January/February 2022

  Christopher Patton :: Glitch Apple Howie Good :: Three poems Kenneth M Cale :: Three visual poems Christian Ward :: Three poems Matthew Walsh :: POACHED EGGS Jeremy Scott :: Five poems

about :: where is the river

where is the river :: a poetry experiment is a bi-monthly poetry journal open to a variety of aesthetics, forms and experiences, with a preference towards showcasing work by emerging writers. There is no single path, nor any single way. Founded in September 2017. Edited by Kiefer JD Logan.