Liz Dearden
Into The Temescal
Out of the seventh window the sweat pours
into the red shoes.
She has lit the reluctant fire, defies frost,
shakes the scales of armadillo and fish
from her salted hair.
In front of appalled stars
she hunted cochineal beetles
among the cactus flowers,
coaxed their brittleness
with a silver blade,
broke their backs in her mortar
pounding them to a crimson paste
for smearing across her cheek.
The birds of the Sierras are parched
they flock to the breast
that drips milk as white as cactus juice
into their desperate beaks.
It was the month of maize
the yellow cobs lie side by side
swollen as moons
their coral teeth bared
in the keeping cellars.
The body with its little lake
lowers itself,
yielding to salinity
bewitched by a clouded turquoise
drawing light into itself
leaving the mountain as dark as soot,
as dark as an eye
drowning another in its inky fluids.
Page(s) 74
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