Melissa Studdard

FOR BAUDELAIRE

In the woods you found a carcass with maggots in its chest,

with waterfalls in its eyes, with the buzz of life still

hovering around its skull, and in commemoration, you grabbed

your sweetheart’s hand, with your left, and on your right, you

snatched the clasped hand of the world and said: Look here, how

we build skyscrapers in the cavity of death’s groin, how we

paint lilacs on its ribs. We will drive motor cars over its

bones and laugh in the waning perfume of midnight, and, my love,

I will write you a poem, a tribute to your beautiful decay,

to your rotting thighs, to the death you will birth with sex

because, truly, this is beauty—this festering carcass in the woods,

this putrid nag, truth. And in it, you will live forever.

                        Previous publication: The Fox Chase Review

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KILLING THE MOTH

Yesterday I drew a very big, rather rare night moth, called the death’s head, its colouring of amazing distinction . . . I had to kill it to paint it, and it was a pity, the beastie was so beautiful. —Vincent Van Gogh

The flapping of night-wings by fire,

a rattling in the skull,

a moth, wings cloudy white,

tinged carmine and faded green:

all is captured in a sigh of pity—

beauty must hold still to be seen.

What is death to the dead

when art gives wing to the living?

When what was gauzy and frail

presses its form to human

shores, to be held there, foam swept

through quicksilver days,

there to withstand the turning of seasons.

The leaves will green again,

brown again, gold, and green again.

The leaves will go red.

Red, and the death’s head moth flutters,

steadfast, swept beyond the joy and danger

of a shift in wind.

Artist, have you learned the moth?

You are more alike than you can see.

Not in the way a night can swarm to flame,

but like a gust of stars

breathless with foretelling—

Markings, like the lines

that streak your palm, tell of leaves

pressed into a book. Their color fades.

They rot. They leave behind

an imprint on the page.

                        Previous publication: Boulevard

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YOU WERE A BIRD; YOU ARE THE SEA

—inspired by the John Sokol painting,

Icarus Practicing

Stretch them wide

as God’s first breath.

From tip to tip

there is no time.

Just the rumbling

of a tune

in your makeshift

beak, and bright

sky galloping

through the hollow

of bone. Bucket

of air, spine built

from light, boy

full of flutters

and drafts—you

speak mountain

stream, laurel leaf,

rolling cloud—

the dialect of flight.

The world drifts

like a madness

inside you—earth, 

trees, and birds,

feathers, wings,

and night, the start

and end of time

rowing through

blood’s currents,

sailing inside

the freedom

of mind,

now split open

by a whirlwind

of koan, pushed

like air through

sky’s vast lung.

When I go,

let me go

like you, Icarus,

past my own

limits before

I fall. Let me

be a flesh-toned

streak in the sky,

a flash in the blue,

a sunburst

of wonder

rejoining

the ripples

of sea.

                        Previous publication: Pirene's Fountain

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BAREFOOT RONDELET

—inspired by the Remedios Varo painting,

To Be Reborn

To be reborn,

step barefoot from this world, praying

to be reborn

wild-eyed, seared by life, and graying

already with wisdom, forewarned:

it’s a sad, sweet, brief delaying,

to be reborn.

                        Previous publication: Tryst

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A PRAYER

Someday I’ll meet you again,

and we’ll sleep like the eyes of hurricanes,

lidless in our trek to taste each other’s tongues

as they throw dirt over my face, into the quivers

of my throat. I’ve been meaning to say a little

something each night, to light a candle

in the doorframe, set fire

to the empty church: For you, I’d drive

the people back into each other’s arms,

where they could see, finally, your

softness again. I meant to say I knew you

were unhoused, the original nomad. There were

none living there among the pews. What was left

was pressed among the pages of psalmody.

And this is no new thing.

Another costume off: My golden hair.

My blue-green eyes.

Shed beneath the dirt.

I meant to say, how are you? And, also,

this is not about me. Because there are tigers

scratching at the swirling wind, and there are monsters

banging on the shutter doors. Because I’ve had no time

to think or eat properly or rest.

It was all just a blind sneeze in the wind.

Let me know everything about you, please.

I’ll go back. Do it right this time.

I’ll be a dragonfly, a pebble, an earthworm, a flea.

                        Previous publication: Ishaan Literary Review

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NIRVANA

—inspired by the Remedios Varo painting,

To Be Reborn

There’s no mother’s milk

the second time around,

just a crescent moon

floating in a goblet bigger

than your own head, or maybe

it’s really the world in there,

shimmering and dark,

ready to be consumed.

I’d say be careful drinking

out of that thing, but

how trite it would sound

after what you’ve just

done, tearing through

Mother Earth’s most intimate

fabric, ripping a frayed slit

for yourself. Think of trees

poking branches where

they don’t belong,

encroaching windows built

to keep them out. You’re

something like that, one

of nature’s great mysteries

thrusting into the narrow rooms

of humanity, rattling

between the walls

of this synthetic  

life, time after time, birth

after birth, like a hamster

in a cage on a wheel. Sure,

each ride is different, but

at some point you’ll break

down that cage door, say

goodbye to the spinning

wheel, and finally run free.

                        Previous publication: Tryst

© Melissa Studdard


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