Bobby Parrott
Poem
Electronic feelers precede
our shifting train car, my brain
in its shell grooved, lunar.
The Rockies smooth
open our skin, its tiny eruptions
a shower of unguarded stars.
Colorado—
its eagle prayers
a cyclone of growing. Gravity
cats’ claws scratch from cliff edge
to temple stone. Shakespeare’s
dream a strident moon unspooling
its lightning-threaded hail.
Pearl Street ribbons spun
through empty hands, drenched
in Ariel’s waves. You needn’t wonder
why perfect girls drive weather
outside their sorrows,
untie the tempest
from its altitude of memory.
Open yourself. Persistent mountains
teach peace. Opalescent boulders
speak colors into lofty.
Absent whales flood enormity
with hot-blooded intention, fluke
mantra, ascend the harpoon—
My silent roll backward, my Lake
of Summer, my Sea of Peaks.
Float larger with me. Unloose
your swarm of gods! Feed the sky
with the insane laughter of haystacks
aflame, your hungry organs purr.