The Zingara Project

Tag: qarrtsiluni

  • Advent by Lynda Fleet Perry

    ~ for Mark

    From the farm’s back field the wind is rising
    as we walk, holding hands, to cut our tree
    in the crisp night air. The moon is rising

    over the skeletal tips of branches, forking
    into the gathering dark. We can see,
    from the farm’s back field, the wind rising

    by the way the old cedar moans, tossing
    its now-black foliage, as if to shake free.
    On this solstice night, the moon’s rising

    arc holds Venus—glimmering and winking—
    at celestial arms’ length. They’re married
    above the farm’s back field—wind rising

    as if to rush the inevitable coupling
    of sickle and orb, a brilliant zenith
    of this longest night. The moon is rising

    higher. Now we can see the tree, leaning
    crookedly, our Yule pine, its shadow spindly
    in the moon’s silver light.  Night has risen
    over the farm’s back field. The wind still rises.

    —

    Lynda Fleet Perry is the author of a chapbook of poems, At Winter Light Farm, published by Finishing Line Press in 2011. Her work has been published in Blackbird, Defunct, qarrtsiluni, New Zoo Poetry Review, and other journals. She received her MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University in 2014. She lives in Richmond, Virginia, with her husband and daughter, and works as a writer and communications manager for a botanical garden. 

  • Rites of Spring by Donna Vorreyer

    I discovered this week’s poignant poem honoring woman’s best friend in the first issue of the new online literary magazine, Mixed Fruit, published June 1, 2011. It is a bi-monthly periodical and the second issue, published August 2st, is now available. Enjoy!

    Rites of Spring
    by Donna Vorreyer

    Gardening, I come to the place
    where we buried our first dog, the dirt
    now sprouted with daylillies and sprigs
    of weedy thistle. My husband dug the hole
    in early fall when her hips began to fail,
    before the ground became unbreakable.
    She lasted until March, the plot
    covered in plywood and late snow.

    I pull the thistle’s gangly roots, hoping
    for orange blossoms instead of burrs,
    I try not to think of her bones beneath,
    the beetles that pick her carcass clean
    of the sleek, black fur that once velveted
    my hand. Ghost ants haunt the undersides
    of upturned rocks and branches, scribble
    their white calligraphy of industry.

    Our golden retriever limps up, nudges
    her grey muzzle at my elbow, collapses
    her own crooked hips beside me. She does
    not rise until I do, her front legs bearing
    the slow bones of her backside. I stoop to bury
    my face in her neck as if love could keep her
    from this dirt. As if love could fail as easily
    as flesh, as flower. As if it were that frail.

    Donna Vorreyer spends her days convincing middle-schoolers that words matter. Her work as appeared in many journals including Weave, Cider Press Review, qarrtsiluni, and Rhino. She is a contributor to the blog Voice Alpha, and you can also find her online at her own blog, Put Words Together. Make Meaning