Lynn Strongin

[FROM THE CYCLE "THE CRAB IS ANOTHER ANIMAL"]

I.      THE STROKE

As marshlands tilt
with water
so can a brain

flood.  Like a darkroom with silver salts       the photograph in the developing pan.

A dot of blood in the first image
five scans down
a pool, confusion. A stroke of swan’s wing.

II.
A beach walk. A dusk sky. Darkening, The stark magnet like factories in lime-lands.
Firemen & Fishermen.

If I’d had girls
they would have commanded old-fashioned names;
Sarah, Martha, Ruth.

A gray streak of wings.
a sunset:
Years pass, put blaze marks on trees. Our scores are
marked by notches
on the willow wand.

The pearly fire.        Decades like piano-roll         Ivory inlay.
Poets are thieves of things:
So spend time behind bars.
 
Betrayal
even of a giftmakes grief.

This road to curing is
long as the
autobahn.

III.

What a rotten day for provincial elections.
The old box of the Sony
crackles.

The bulb had to be vacuumed:
the light
was knee-deep in powder.

The terrible
beauty
that life is in wartime:

camphorous
Dutch blend tobacco
of old movies, your knees kissing.
I was filling with sorrowtalk,
a torn cord
Paralysis        central nervous system connection to limbs snapped by lightning
         replaced by the alphabet angel, bending down, comforting:
consonants & vowels
getting it true, telling the story, having my narrative knit to world.

An American poet living in Canada, Lynn Strongin has published work in over thirty anthologies, fifty-five journals both in print and on-line, and will have nine books published by the middle of this year. Some of the journals in which poetry appears are Poetry, Prairie Schooner, Shenandoah, Southern Humanities Review, The American Voice, New Works Review (featured poet) Argotist Review (U.K.) Snow Monkey upcoming as featured poet, Artistry in Life upcoming featured poet. Work of hers was recently nominated for a Pushcart Prize.