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Semaphore A shroud, an inferno, a
ring of scars about her neck. Beauty consists in
this, in the ability to doubt. A mantle of white.
A mantle of stars. Later, light enters the room
surreptitiously. Through a honeycomb door.
Blue door and honey light. The bed is empty, even the
mourners have gone. Light manifests in
hexagonals, the brilliant array shuddering in the shock of a
car bombing. Blue enamel tiles clatter on the floor,
composing distraction. A lost calligraphy.
Necessarily, unloading occurs before burial, a custom of
semaphore. Though the content of their arms has been
emptied. Blue light and honey door, honeyed air
weights their eyes as with coins. The washing of the
dead, a devotion of ritual water, progresses from right to
left. The shroud, a binding, also a semaphore of
lashing. Though never of red. Honey room,
honeycomb, forgets prayer, signals instead with light.
The bed is empty, even the coverlet lost. After forty
years, the ground returns from the dead. tribute |
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Marthe Reed lives in Lafayette, Louisiana, fortunate gap threaded between Katrina and Rita. Her poetry has recently appeared in Exquisite Corpse, Golden Handcuffs Review, HOW2, moria, and eratio. A chapbook is forthcoming from Lavender Ink. |
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