Poetry

August Trance

by

Radames Ortiz

We settle into our private picnic
Joggers circle the field
And basset hounds drag their
Tongues, lapping ants
Into their mouths

We lay our heads on crushed grass
Witness the evening coming on
The clouds spinning into chaos
Like storms, like cities
The feel of slow rotation of earth

Silent but loving
In the mist of weeping willows
And branches twisted into headaches
The clay of our brows accept all forms
Bay windows and arched doorways

Cicadas and stucco rooftops shimmering
Outstretched in this strange calm
How utterly haunting and doomed we feel
But always, without fail, together
amongst heat playing on pebbles

You and I—a dollhouse saga
In the pearly light of an afternoon
We hardly touch but know
our bodies’ desire for war
And we know we found it

This beautiful gravity
Moving slowly by us
And through us,
As if we were ruins,
As if we were ghosts