Cinderella & Darwin in the Green Zone Blackened As Any Dead Ember

Painting by Luis Royo


cinderella & darwin in the green zone blackened as any dead ember


he says in sleep
to wrap your
body round
a tree

how the cake
with white
grapes
floats

or when she
kisses him
how she
still

hides &
the prisoners
tentatively ask
if the war killed us all;

tiers of being & the g’on’e

* * *

or the broom unused in the corner
& leaves like lost crowns
upturned—skittering—
scratching at what
relentlessly
refuses

(o desperate loss—who sniffs about—
this want that must turn again—

who remembers that green sprig or
how red the year once burned)

ghosts of music pull
at seas—we heard
before or was
desire first
& last
alone

(she sweeps slow
as if the hours

undressed
a fire);

a Cinderella in your turn

* * *

sandy pool
sea glass
fiddlers
knees
hand
flat
pressing
into the thin
place where light
mixes like a lonely fire

the first eye
pulls stars
from her
mouth
white
with
absence
those days
hung on lines like
skins of falling angels

what would she give to see
beyond what her hands push away
she said she would not eat an oyster
for it reminded her of his heart
he said she was hopeless
memories were skins
of murdered hours
of desire that
forgot how
to sing

* * *

empty
Darwin
watches for
young turtles
to be swallowed
in the green tumult
how loneliness draws
a line to everything
& even old sorrow
carries warmth

will you filter
a surge of
moon
longing
a shore that
runs to the plains
the red vein of a gill
the urge of tongues
to a salty lip—
taste it

hello she
says &
he trembles
as if the voice
of every ghost
gathered in
one word
or where
a pool
waits


Richard Lance Williams

Posted over on More Poetry