Hobble Creek Review
| Patty Paine |
BENEATH EACH FULL MOON
After my mother died I dreamed
that for a pouch filled with cloud-ear
mushrooms and a cluster of mugwort
I made my way down narrow, filthy
streets, past hovels of mud-smeared
wattle to press jade into the palm
of an ancient sage. Her hands
glanced my skin as she tied the sackcloth
pouch around my neck. They were smooth
as celadon, light as breath. I followed
the Naktong River to K'yongsang where
trees slumped beneath icy shrouds
and groaned in constant wind. I crossed
P'aro-Ho Lake, the black ice crazed
as a maebyong vase. I reached Kyongju
as winter relented to spring, then the Hwangshae Sea
led me south where swollen buds of prunus trees
threatened to burst beneath my touch.
A last blush of orange slipped
from the sky when I arrived at my mother's home,
where larchwood grows, and red stones
from the P'yongyang volcano hiss into ocean.
At the volcano's edge I scooped warm
black sand until I was kneeling
before all the emptiness I could bear. I slipped
the pouch from my neck and poured the mushrooms
and mugwort into the gorge. As I drew back
the sand, a dull ache
throbbed in my chest. By morning
wind had swept the sackcloth far out to sea.
After my mother died I dreamed
that for a pouch filled with cloud-ear
mushrooms and a cluster of mugwort
I made my way down narrow, filthy
streets, past hovels of mud-smeared
wattle to press jade into the palm
of an ancient sage. Her hands
glanced my skin as she tied the sackcloth
pouch around my neck. They were smooth
as celadon, light as breath. I followed
the Naktong River to K'yongsang where
trees slumped beneath icy shrouds
and groaned in constant wind. I crossed
P'aro-Ho Lake, the black ice crazed
as a maebyong vase. I reached Kyongju
as winter relented to spring, then the Hwangshae Sea
led me south where swollen buds of prunus trees
threatened to burst beneath my touch.
A last blush of orange slipped
from the sky when I arrived at my mother's home,
where larchwood grows, and red stones
from the P'yongyang volcano hiss into ocean.
At the volcano's edge I scooped warm
black sand until I was kneeling
before all the emptiness I could bear. I slipped
the pouch from my neck and poured the mushrooms
and mugwort into the gorge. As I drew back
the sand, a dull ache
throbbed in my chest. By morning
wind had swept the sackcloth far out to sea.
Patty Paine is the author of Elegy & Collapse (Finishing Line Press,
2005). She is currently assistant professor of English at Virginia
Commonwealth University School for the Arts in Doha, Qatar. She
has had poems published in The Atlanta Review, The Journal, The
Southern Poetry Review and other journals.
2005). She is currently assistant professor of English at Virginia
Commonwealth University School for the Arts in Doha, Qatar. She
has had poems published in The Atlanta Review, The Journal, The
Southern Poetry Review and other journals.
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