Leslie Monsour
Polishing Off the Sherry
...my eyes, like the Sherry in the Glass, that the Guest leaves...
--from the letters of Emily Dickinson
Refracted lamplight casts a flame,
a gloss on what she wrote,
an amber flash that toasts her name
and lubricates my throat.
The glass I leave's an empty one;
I polish off each drop.
It's only when the bottle's done
that I know when to stop.
Were I a Homestead guest on those
nights of superb surprise,
I'd kill the means by which she chose
to acquaint us with her eyes.
May Nasturtiums
"Street handsome...golden runaway"
--In Memory of Thom Gunn
Their wild, non-native season ends
Before we wish to see them go.
For weeks they graced our car-choked glens
In shimmering, cascading glow --
As one with a capacious heart,
Who revelled in the seediest worlds,
Lifted a grubby vine to art,
And showered the Tenderloin with pearls.
Fair pulse, your bloom is brief, seraphic;
It weaves its unimpeded tropes,
Then leaves us staring at mere traffic,
Winding below the sallow slopes.
September Night
Moonlit, a nimble spider weaves.
Low creatures stir in every shadow:
Full cricket choir, wild clash of leaves,
A possum drops an avocado.
Beyond earth's mild nocturnal din
Persists an ever-present drone
Of less primeval origin,
The rumble of the 101.
The King's Road, El Camino Real,
The highway of the mission bell,
For centuries an oxcart trail
From San Diego to Carmel,
Now issues white noise everywhere:
The rush of rubber on cement,
The eruption of combusted air,
The roar of miles-per-gallon spent.
It reaches canyons miles away,
Where white moths fly into the moon,
As owls swoop low after their prey,
And summer will be over soon.
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| AUTHOR BIO |
| A native of Los Angeles, Leslie Monsour has poems, translations, and reviews in numerous journals and anthologies, including: Poetry, The Formalist,
The Dark Horse, Able Muse, The Edge City Review, Pivot, Iambs & Trochees,
Measure, A Formal Feeling Comes, California Poetry From the Gold Rush to the Present, the Poet Laureate's website, American Life in Poetry, as
well as Garrison Keillor's Public Radio website, The Writer's Almanac. She has
published four chapbooks, most recently, Travel Plan (Robert L. Barth, 2001)
and Indelibility (Aralia Press, 1999). Her first full-length collection, The Alarming Beauty of the Sky, was published in 2005 by Red Hen Press. |
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| POETRY CONTRIBUTORS |
 Rhina P. Espaillat
Kate Light
Judith Moffett
Leslie Monsour
Jennifer Reeser
Marilyn L. Taylor
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Award-winning artist and photographer Jo Yarrington on writing, liminality and the dream void. |
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