Stacey Balkun
The Wind in a Corner
after the painting by Kay Sage
I don’t want to lean this far away from you,
but bone-shudder tall and still, you’ve turned
so rigid. Backed into a corner, windblown
cliffs stiff against sunwash—have you angled
away from me, or from us all? Baby,
I call you baby from exasperation. There’s more
to see in this world if we don’t let it dry up
around us. Once, we found love in this
landscape: cholla blooming like my bouquet,
petaled fury. A gust blows up my skirt and I wish
you’d laugh with me. Crouch down. Look at this
slash of blue rock against red dirt. See, a sprout
of some wild something rooted in the hard earth,
reaching for the wind we make with our hands.
Stacey Balkun is the author of Jackalope-Girl Learns to Speak & Lost City Museum. Winner of the 2017 Women's National Book Association Poetry Prize, her work has appeared in Prairie Schooner, Crab Orchard Review, The Rumpus, Muzzle, and other journals. Chapbook Series Editor for Sundress Publications, Stacey holds an MFA from Fresno State and teaches poetry online at The Poetry Barn & The Loft. Visit her website here: www.staceybalkun.com
Return to September 2018 Edition
after the painting by Kay Sage
I don’t want to lean this far away from you,
but bone-shudder tall and still, you’ve turned
so rigid. Backed into a corner, windblown
cliffs stiff against sunwash—have you angled
away from me, or from us all? Baby,
I call you baby from exasperation. There’s more
to see in this world if we don’t let it dry up
around us. Once, we found love in this
landscape: cholla blooming like my bouquet,
petaled fury. A gust blows up my skirt and I wish
you’d laugh with me. Crouch down. Look at this
slash of blue rock against red dirt. See, a sprout
of some wild something rooted in the hard earth,
reaching for the wind we make with our hands.
Stacey Balkun is the author of Jackalope-Girl Learns to Speak & Lost City Museum. Winner of the 2017 Women's National Book Association Poetry Prize, her work has appeared in Prairie Schooner, Crab Orchard Review, The Rumpus, Muzzle, and other journals. Chapbook Series Editor for Sundress Publications, Stacey holds an MFA from Fresno State and teaches poetry online at The Poetry Barn & The Loft. Visit her website here: www.staceybalkun.com
Return to September 2018 Edition