Posy: a charm almanack & atlas | Elizabeth Treadwell | Lark Books & Writing Studio 2015
photo by Ivy Jackson
To Faraway Centuries
we are the choices we’ve made
in fragrant, leafy patches of daydream
sourgrass this sugar hour
houses like the edges of books
under a lemon moon
A Posy for Lupercalia
the shell-hued god-pets of the realms
tenderly the star-limned
as you say & do
as shadowed geese glide like dusk
over the freeway
Orpha
creatures dripping in light
of stone & city, their ink-filled
eyes & songs, their darks
& earthling limbs, rootings
& dwellings & dreams
All Saints
my marvelous unhappiness, goodbye
shy impermanence bequeath me
All Souls
the words roll out like little lambs
& devils sometimes
like little crowns & mirrors
swimming toward the point of days
for we are made of dark & salt
of waterlight
of care of care
of care
Vera-Alma
the little muses on the first day
the strange brave light of the new
we are the choices we’ve made
in fragrant, leafy patches of daydream
sourgrass this sugar hour
houses like the edges of books
under a lemon moon
A Posy for Lupercalia
the shell-hued god-pets of the realms
tenderly the star-limned
as you say & do
as shadowed geese glide like dusk
over the freeway
Orpha
creatures dripping in light
of stone & city, their ink-filled
eyes & songs, their darks
& earthling limbs, rootings
& dwellings & dreams
All Saints
my marvelous unhappiness, goodbye
shy impermanence bequeath me
All Souls
the words roll out like little lambs
& devils sometimes
like little crowns & mirrors
swimming toward the point of days
for we are made of dark & salt
of waterlight
of care of care
of care
Vera-Alma
the little muses on the first day
the strange brave light of the new
Elizabeth Treadwell is a writer and mother. Her previous books of poetry include Eve Doe (Double Lucy, 1997); Chantry (Chax, 2004); LILYFOIL + 3 (O Books, 2004); Birds & Fancies (Shearsman, 2007); and Virginia or the mud-flap girl (Dusie, 2012). She served as director of Small Press Traffic in San Francisco from 2000-2007, where her projects included the journal Traffic; the conference Coordinates 2002: Indigenous Writing Now; and revivals, for Poets Theater, of plays by Djuna Barnes and Gertrude Stein. She now directs Lark Books & Writing Studio and curates Lark Readings at Studio Grand.