21st

me
Quit saying
“okay & ya”
& putting hand
up to mouth.
What I like about
Waseem.
I like his black
eyes. The way I can
see myself inside
them and the way
they sparkle. I also
like the way he knows
all those songs and
the way he looks at up

A quick note to let you know about some very lovely poems in this October’s issue of Poetry by my friend Eric Ekstrand. They’re each called “Appleblossom”. Via Poetry:
“Each “Appleblossom” is a verse translation from the Japanese of a short selection from the notebooks of Chiri, Bashō’s traveling companion during the years between Withered Chestnuts and Travelogue of Weatherbeaten Bones.”
I really like Eric’s “Appleblossom” poems- there’s an attention to sound that, along with the longer lines, make each poem feel whole, like I could drop one on the ground and it’d be okay. They smell like fields & grass & rocks & wind. There’s a delicate homoeroticism running through the work, something I always enjoy.
If you don’t have the October issue of Poetry, you can (and should) read the “Appleblossom” poems in Poetry’s online archives.
Two other poems by Eric appeared on _Catch/Confetti back in April. Coincidentally, they’re perfect for Halloween- have a look at Eric’s poems ON BECOMING A GHOST and THE HOUSE ON VERSE LN.
The monarch,
stuck to my car battery,
detaches intact,
wings folded down
in paper-mâché flight.
Just that side
is ruined, burned black
where the fingers— like
veins in a leaf—
touched the electric box.
I show it to my sister,
holding the petrified-
pollinator up
like half a flower. Then
I rest it on the corner
of my desk
and examine the slated
wings, stitched with dust,
and the legs
cooled into a cringe.
The eyes shine back
and to the side, saying
you wake up one morning
and it’s all dreams,
then nothing,
this life you have now.
by Michael Klenda