Ruth Baumann
Human
The sinkholes with their crossbows / the sinkholes closemouthed
There are so many dimensions to connection
No finite number makes easy transcendence
The brain geometric / the brain watercolor
One foot in / then the other / then what the feet pray to
The failure in ekphrasis is its implication of one object on another
We do not impact / we merge
We unzip each other until the future runs red & raw
The roots exposed after spring’s first storm
Let me in I am knocking at your breath
Human II
One impatiens two impatiens three
The jaw in constant / the mind its follower
Upgrade the model / listen to a new song
How much skin to cover the uncertainties / asks spring
How much spring until color seems a fountain of impossibility
I will wake up tomorrow & again / there’s extra
There is nature inside you it is warm & pretend-civilized
I would like to live / & more, with you
Psalm of the Legends [from the Mermaid poems]
Little song: the substance of loss / is the substance of gain.
The first of us were thought / to come from shame.
Blessed is the origin that believes. Blessed is the legend
that walks, that swims, that raises itself to the blood moon.
An apple picked, a form falling off a cliff,
another hundred apples picked, sweet snake, on purpose then―
Others say after death. But all say from love,
say such soft hearts, pick them up, weigh them in their hands
like tiny springtime peaches, squeeze them
until the fruit punctures, until juice rolls down the palm
like the temptation of a lifeline, sticky & pretend-prophetic
before the sea licks the future blank & growls go / go/ go―
Ruth Baumann received her MFA from the University of Memphis this Spring, & begins her PhD at Florida State University in the Fall. Her chapbook I'll Love You Forever & Other Temporary Valentines won the Salt Hill Dead Lake Chapbook Contest & was released in May. Poems are published or forthcoming in Colorado Review, Sonora Review, Sycamore Review, The Journal, Third Coast & others listed at http://www.ruthbaumann.com
Return to September 2015 Edition
The sinkholes with their crossbows / the sinkholes closemouthed
There are so many dimensions to connection
No finite number makes easy transcendence
The brain geometric / the brain watercolor
One foot in / then the other / then what the feet pray to
The failure in ekphrasis is its implication of one object on another
We do not impact / we merge
We unzip each other until the future runs red & raw
The roots exposed after spring’s first storm
Let me in I am knocking at your breath
Human II
One impatiens two impatiens three
The jaw in constant / the mind its follower
Upgrade the model / listen to a new song
How much skin to cover the uncertainties / asks spring
How much spring until color seems a fountain of impossibility
I will wake up tomorrow & again / there’s extra
There is nature inside you it is warm & pretend-civilized
I would like to live / & more, with you
Psalm of the Legends [from the Mermaid poems]
Little song: the substance of loss / is the substance of gain.
The first of us were thought / to come from shame.
Blessed is the origin that believes. Blessed is the legend
that walks, that swims, that raises itself to the blood moon.
An apple picked, a form falling off a cliff,
another hundred apples picked, sweet snake, on purpose then―
Others say after death. But all say from love,
say such soft hearts, pick them up, weigh them in their hands
like tiny springtime peaches, squeeze them
until the fruit punctures, until juice rolls down the palm
like the temptation of a lifeline, sticky & pretend-prophetic
before the sea licks the future blank & growls go / go/ go―
Ruth Baumann received her MFA from the University of Memphis this Spring, & begins her PhD at Florida State University in the Fall. Her chapbook I'll Love You Forever & Other Temporary Valentines won the Salt Hill Dead Lake Chapbook Contest & was released in May. Poems are published or forthcoming in Colorado Review, Sonora Review, Sycamore Review, The Journal, Third Coast & others listed at http://www.ruthbaumann.com
Return to September 2015 Edition