Ellipses of the South

gasher｜ issue 1

If a forest admires you with calm grey eyes,

every car rolls slowly by.

If there are stages here

and on them stand blue marines,

I came up with my lover.

Navies can be raised, but not without citrus.

Then the Navy men hoard oranges.

Then they sway

about the entrance to the gala

like fireflies

in sawgrass, like drunks in a ritual invisible

to the moneyed.

If every car rolls slowly by

it wasn't the large fire that razed us,

but the hundred embers

that burned into our sleep.

Then we walked into the forest twice:

once to find an orchard

and again to find an orchard,

but could go no deeper than the fringe.

This was one of many gaps in the landscape.

If all of the action happens offscreen,

the cowboy

has been riding in the wrong direction.

Then I came here with a strange partner,

made stranger by the southern light.

If there is a voice speaking in parallel

to the movement of the clouds,

it would not be laughing.

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