Eileen R. Tabios


COPPER RAIN REDUX


and then the kiss
and then the greeting
“swollen underground with rain”


whisper
               song
                              stairway



stairway
               singing
                              whisper



whisper
               singing
                              stairway






POLITICAL ACT
(after Christian Hawkey’s “Green Solitude”)


Maya was charged
with building a memorial
to the sound
of an empty road
cutting through a cornfield
with no visible borders—

The client ordered:
“It must be figurative.
It cannot be abstract.”

Fortunately for art,
tired soldiers are boiling
opened tins of corn
over small, hushed fires.

It was a late summer harvest—
By then the ears had burst.

Eileen Tabios' latest books include a biography of sorts, THE BLIND CHATELAINE'S KEYS (BlazeVOX Books, 2008) and the poetry collection NOTA BENE EISWEIN (2008-2009) from which these two poems were taken. She also happily edits one of the funnest internet parties around, GALATEA RESURRECTS (A POETRY ENGAGMENT).

 
 
 
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