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Margaret Lerhe
I perform a rosary on your chest,
a prayer of broken ribs.
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Night of Starlings
Tonight fell on us like black starlings.
This rain—a constant murmur,
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Maps of the Market Garden and the Memory of Your Passage
In my maps of the market garden
I always forgot to include your journeys.
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Fog on the Juan de Fuca
Bloated tankers, lying in the starboard fog—
cranes, mountains of coal.
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The Morning I Wish to Wake to
To see the sequoias as plaintiffs,
angry litigants calling their cases
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Marlin and the Timeless Steppe
“Let me show you my favourite place.”
We left after morning coffee,
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Marlin and The Dark Night of the Soul
In the evening, trees silhouette like shattered veins,
white of blood and first light’s frost.
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Marlin and the Great Migration
During the night, the great migration began.
Marlin, my faithful ‘89 Toyota, was jostled and shifted
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Marlin and the Teeth of Winter
Out of a quiet and hardly seen patter
of freezing rain, beating a pattern of poissonce,
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Marlin and the Inland Ocean
It rained so hard that in the morning
my car had drifted to parts unknown.
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Strange Creatures Pt. 7: September Seventh
Your smile is sweet as a stand of sugarcane
at the back of Summer’s land.
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Strange Creatures Pt. 6: Antelope and Rose
Petulant in season and out,
eyes that taunt the lion