Grasshopper
Walk the path all night as the sky fills with fireflies
A moth greets you when you reach the porch steps
Sensibility of sorrow rearranged sensibility of soul burn
Sensibility of since you were gone and since you came back
Sensibility of tongue and throat and vibration
Sensibility of the busted wall singing
Sensibility of brightness just as it turns to sunlight
Childhood is an old doorway
Childhood is music in the background
That can’t quite be identified childhood is the grasshopper
Disappearing into the field of oblivion
Andrea Syzdek received her MFA from the University of Houston. She currently writes independently for her website Against the Grain (andreasyzdek.com) which focuses on book reviews and essays.
Two Sonnets
The Sound of Many Birds
Repeat the dream of running away to a field
Kneel down inside that wild cosmic flicker
Deer leap from the woods at the edge of seduction
Mirror lined with candles flickering pale gold
Return to the full moon and rain pouring under it
Vulgar is the trajectory your tongue follows
Return to roads evening out across green hills
Night blooming jasmine at your feet
Only the swan you once were can play
Sexual hymns you wrote secretly in another life
Bring light into the void blurred but ecstatic
Lead the way to zest in the wild grass
Crush bits of magic fear is not the bloom
Mercy flickers when you open the door
Water’s Surface
Nakedness you face when you face your reflection
A haunted ghost that disappears into an unknown garden
Always washed clean until she becomes dirty again
A fork in the trail points in neither direction
Watches you watch the wind nearing a desire
Fresh and vibrant and holy and imperfect and balanced
Words you haven’t wrestled yourself free from yet
That bird and her solid repetitive song emerges
When you thought she wanted to stay invisible
Flying low to the ground in the aftermath of the
Microscopically changed riverwild dream
You rock in your arms by the light of the full moon
Where the fish kisses the water’s surface
Where the water’s surface kisses the fish back