Merlini - 3 poems

 

 Katarina Merlini A LITANY FOR A GIRL


“Wherever the spirit would go, they went, and the wheels rose along with them;  for the spirit of the living creatures was in the wheels.” Ezekiel, 1:19-21 


But, still, in their horror,

I think of them—the angels, 

those wheels of eyes spinning, 

beings of divine light, they live 

where the material begins to take shape. 

Know that I am thinking of you, too. 

Know that I haven’t been to a church in years. 

Know that, lately, I am in need 

of inspiration, of faith and justice—

could you ever forgive me? 

I wouldn’t. I think of you on that hill, 

nodding, sliding off the bench, 

twisted in what might be, in another time, 

called divine rapture. But you were dying. 

And I was watching. And I couldn’t say 

anything until the paramedics came,

and then all I could say was 

“I don’t think she’s ok.”

And you weren’t. And I left.

So, what is material anyway, 

but something to be twisted, 

and I believe this as much 

as I believe the Thrones compel me 

because I believe I stand the best chance 

for them of all, to allot me grace 

for leaving you there to die. 

Later, I would hear  

you were airlifted to a Detroit hospital,

a place better equipped for you,

what this world had you resort to. 

I haven’t been to a church in years.

But there is one,

one that I pass by every day 

to remember kneeling—mouth open, 

lace-gloved and accepting—for grace. 

You don’t know this, 

because I didn’t have the time to tell you, 

but when I was younger I would cry so hard

until I vomited in the carpet in front of a crucifix 

begging for it to have been me, for Him, 

on a hill in Calgary. And I would beg 

for that now too. For you. 

On a hill in Northern Michigan.

Here are my words then, they fall 

limp and heavy from my veins. 

I have always been close to death and

I am trying to fall in love with myself. 

I wonder if you are too. 

It seems impossible 

until I think of the Thrones, 

the angels of humility and justice, yet 

so terrible and flamboyant—

how deeply they must love.

And sometimes I imagine perhaps, 

if just for a moment, 

they consider something other 

than the divine, perhaps, 

for just one moment, they pause 

in their glorias—just once!—and they turn 

to consider one another, 

and with so many eyes 

to behold their mirrored splendor,

they love.


 
 

MIDDLE DISTANCE 

You see, here, everything 

muffled by the slow tinkling 

of ice on snow-glass, fat flakes 

falling, their bodies engorged 

on sky, dragging it down with them

for you. Ice rattle. Thick layer of cloud. 

No one will think to look for you here.

No one else is here yet. And isn’t this

why you come here? To stand 

where other men have walked,

to see a boot crossed over, one

over another, edges frozen 

upward. In this place, beholden,

to nowhere and nothing—

could you believe it?

Believe as if you, yourself, here, 

with your graceless 

and undeserving fingers, 

could remake life—

not just your life but life

by building along the bodylines,

simple as color by numbers. 

Stand. Stand still as the reeds

stalk-straight in this frozen swamp.

Further on, see the curve

of white pine, wind-bent,

encroaching on this nowhere. 

Beset on all sides with snow,

your body pumping off an anemic heat. 

Further on, see the curve

of white pine, wind-bent,

encroaching on this nowhere.

A freezing wind blooms

apple blossoms on your face. 


GONE FISHING

I piled the bodies

of the dead chickens

in the barn because 

death is a disease

that will keep spreading—

the ground was so frozen

I couldn’t get a shovel in.

The first snowless day

in June I’d head down

to the lake, half-thawed

chicken liver in hand, 

and go fishing

for all the darkness

hidden under that water.

I believe in the day

I finally hook that big catch,

by the finger, or eye socket—

I’ll pull out a dead fishermen 

and he will look me in the eye,

say Woman, who are you

to call on all that darkness,

who are you to think

you can hold a piece of it.

And I will say, my God,

my God, I will say, 

after all these years,

I am nobody.

Nobody at all. 


Katarina Merlini was born and raised in Michigan. She resides currently in South Carolina. Find her on Twitter @KatarinaMerlini.