Lacunae Read online

  the fire of the underworld

  seen through a slit between two stones.

  AFTER two days I was luminous and half-naked

  under the crow, the sky

  was his company and he was mine, tied

  to the air as I was to this earth, bitter, enraged, I drowned

  my legs in water I could not reach, my mouth

  is dry but the crow loves me, this morning, his shriek has authority.

  THE ANIMALS were slowly digging in the mud, and were frightened.

  Laughter was the refuge of the weather, and hunger

  sounded like water that had nowhere to drain. More water

  was found under the mud, digging.

  WE CAME across a hunter disguised as a bird.

  The towns pay these lords for protection. This is revealed

  in a parable the women tell. They speak of a rose

  that grew in the desert from a drop of blood.

  THE DANCING GIRL has veiled her body

  in movement. Drums grunt like voices

  calling for water in the sun.

  Dripping onto the hot skin of a drum

  droplets would also dance

  until they soaked up the sound.

  THIS SLIM BODY of yours

  is covered in feathers,

  as if someone intended to hunt you.

  Under this sun

  you cannot be comfortable. Girl of high birth

  let me make bedding

  of your clothes. I have nothing to sleep on

  and no other excuse

  to offer you.

  A TEAR was painted on your cheek

  without ceremony. It looks like a mountain falling

  down your face, and was meant to weigh as much

  in your heart. Yet there is no sadness in you

  as you sit beside me,

  and place another log in the fire.

  AT the bottom of the pond in your heart

  there is no silt

  to stir. Your eyes, wide and clear,

  are made of ocean.

  IF I CAN deceive this girl then let me

  forge mountains

  hard enough to echo the words they’re made of.

  Let me blink, and undo myself for long enough

  to notice I am gone.

  YOU TELL ME I have pine needles for bedding

  and expect me to go home. Sweet girl,

  if your pillow were the moving water of a creek

  I would lie down beside you and ask the fish

  to only nibble at our hair

  until the water cooled our dreams.

  THEY DO NOT want to be noticed

  among so many burning things.

  Their kiss,

  as quiet as the sound left by an ink brush

  moistened by water,

  recording nothing.

  A RIVER has gotten away from you. Pools

  are forming at your feet. Now night

  opens you.

  ONLY THIS MUCH do I know:

  When he came to me I was naked,

  though I waited for him dressed.

  As if the clothes themselves

  were afraid of him. All the strings of my undergarments,

  and even my belt:

  snakes sliding down

  from a tree.

  ON YOUR body I left behind

  the fading moisture of a kiss.

  Weightless as a sewing needle

  resting on your skin.

  You don’t want to move

  because it will roll off of you.

  WHY HAVE my friends spoken of him

  as if he were a spider, and my love

  the silk of his web? Every word he speaks

  weighs so much in my ear, how could he have anything left in him

  to make silk?

  YOUR thin body, encased in my warmth

  like a wick in a flame

  feeding my light

  consumes you.

  BROTHER,

  ever since your promise that one day

  you would return to marry her,

  her thin body has grown thinner

  under her glowing skin,

  like a shipwreck trapped in the closed bulb of a new flower.

  The spine of its keel is almost bulging

  through the petal.

  When are you coming?

  WHAT IS this belt made of, that clasps your dress to your waist?

  Could a bird not carry it away, easily? And your shoulders,

  on which this dress hangs—are they wide enough to hold it

  if you shrug?

  ARE YOU the same girl who sheltered the sun in her hair

  when the night made no room for it? You walked around

  all night, in the kitchen, trying not to wake anyone—trying

  to cover your head with your arms.

  WHO ARE you going to meet tonight

  in the tall grass

  where even snakes cannot find each other?

  Your bare feet

  will be the safest part of you.

  THE RAIN kisses my face

  without your permission. The sun

  heats my skin, the wind

  tightens it. So what do you have to say to me?

  A LAMB blinking over a patch of earth

  does not know what you have done. Feed it,

  and it will eat from your hand

  as if you wore the skin of a washed grape.

  MY TIGERS have left me.

  I awake too late in the day, after a heavy rain

  has played its notes on my roof.

  I don’t even tie them to anything.

  THE MAN who grows flowers in a field

  for lovers to give to one another

  is not himself lonely.

  He left last winter to see his brother,

  and now his field is wild.

  He is not kept company by the wind,

  and dawn alone does not steady his heart.

  All the elements in the mountain pass

  do make their way into the soil,

  but he sleeps at night in a bed

  beside a woman, and is as dreamless as a goat.

  HAIR covered a face

  the way old vines conceal a door.

  The iron eyes of an owl

  open at me

  like ornaments from a mother’s home

  familiar from youth.

  CLAY pots, shaped from the inside

  like a sun

  when the sky was spinning.

  THE red earth changes color when a stream runs over it

  and you have become darker since you married. Sister,

  even the woven strength of youth

  cannot protect you from boredom.

  You used to follow close behind me

  as we raced against the stream.

  YOUR husband is stretched out on the ground

  as if he were listening for something.

  Ask him to come back to the table.

  Whatever was there is now here.

  THE GIRL cries from the number of fingers and toes

  she cannot yet count. Sister, the terror

  at this immense nudity of unknowing

  will in time subside

  like a sea burying a billion colored corals with its name.

  BROTHER, don’t look away when she glances at you,

  and stop trying to find omens in the syllables of her name.

  Go up to her, and say out loud

  the name of our father, and if your voice doesn’t break

  she may even see something of his face

  in yours.

  EVEN as you look at her

  across the vessel of wine

  her parents will pour,

  love will take time to reach her,

  like light—

  tracing the work of dawn

  as she sleeps.

  On another world

  large tree ferns

  descend toward
the sea

  from moist valleys.

  Overhead, our star,

  exploding

  like the radiating veins of a halved grapefruit.

  AS THE village goes up

  in smoke

  a dry cloud is rotating overhead,

  fed like a whirlpool

  in the sky.

  We press our hands together.

  It is better to be

  together in life, willingly,

  than by any force.

  HIS LIMBS covered in sweat, and ash;

  his hair the way it was before it ever grew—

  this was your husband, after the fire

  that even ate water.

  Do not wail, young sister,

  for he wielded the buckets as if they were weapons

  and fought as if the forest were no less his home

  than our village.

  SISTER, when you look at him

  with your black-rimmed eyes,

  let the sun’s rays

  speak for your mouth. Light knows

  what to say of him.

  A SAND dune came toward us like a sailing ship

  made of stone

  that was breaking in the wind.

  WHEN the strange rain singed the outline of a lake into the sand

  we left flowers at every spot where a fish would perish.

  The sand turned to glass, and white in the sun

  the glass spread the sun like a chant.

  I HAVE never seen improvements to the flesh. If a man should steal, let it be sugarcane

  to redden his tongue like a guilty ox. And let it be the holiest light

  to strike the shadows from his mouth. Speech cannot find its way out in that darkness.

  And let it be rice, to sleep on. And let it be

  a woman; green and white as bamboo and milk:

  a smooth stone

  to set upon the chest.

  For I have never known improvements to the flesh.

  ISLANDS are pronounced by the ocean without bubbles.

  Sometimes the ocean chokes on an island

  as it tries to take it back;

  these are left alone.

  These are left alone

  to defy the heat and the birds,

  and when bubbles appear around them

  they harden into reefs.

  Such islands the ocean can no longer pronounce.

  Their names push back the language of the water: a beach.

  LEAVE ME a stone

  from the towering mountain

  that once was still growing in the sea.

  Leave me the moon

  to reflect certainty

  the way a child’s face reflects its mother.

  And leave me your black shadow

  so it can absorb

  the light that claims you are gone.

  AND so

  I envisioned a woman stepping out of the ocean wearing every starfish at once, like armor.

  I crystallized my eyes with the liquor of the seed I planted in my mouth.

  I cut my destiny in two and kept the heavier one.

  Acknowledgments

  Thank you to Jorie Graham—my mentor.

  I wish to express gratitude to the editors of the following journals, in which these poems originally appeared, some in slightly different form:

  CALVIN BEDIENT, Lana Turner:

  “After two days I was luminous and half-naked”; “The afternoon is a fugitive”; “By the evening your hair is curled”; “The ground of the forest has become muddy in the rain”; “If I can deceive this girl then let me”; “Love”; “What is this belt made of, that clasps your dress to your waist?”

  TIMOTHY DONNELLY, Boston Review:

  “A tear was painted on your cheek”; “And if a bird descended on your shoulder”; “Apart from you I am as lost”; “Brother”; “Color is sleeping in some birds”; “Down the river the creatures in the basin prepare”; “The earth was fruit, and stars, and motion”; “Like the wind that gusts coastal pines toward the water”; “Thick in the forest masks are hung in rows, grinning”; “This girl’s words are as ordered”; “This slim body of yours”

  BIN RAMKE, Denver Quarterly:

  “A body looks like an unopened bell”; “At the bottom of the pond in your heart”; “The growing fingers of clouds meet”; “House, floating under moon”; “I have never seen improvements to the flesh. If a man should steal, let it be sugarcane”; “Islands are pronounced by the ocean without bubbles”; “On your back you sleep as if your wings were planted in the sand”; “The star has given me a body”; “The wave has come to collect the little ports on the coast”; “We came across a hunter disguised as a bird”; “When the sun is wide and drying and filled”

  BRADFORD MORROW, Conjunctions:

  “A glacier glows pink”; “A lamb blinking over a patch of earth”; “The animals were slowly digging in the mud, and were frightened”; “As the village goes up”; “Approach shadows like shallow water”; “A sand dune came toward us like a sailing ship”; “Between kisses the air is quiet”; “The bird is in the center of the sun”; “Birds aglow in yellow do not carry ashes”; “Brother, don’t look away when she glances at you”; “Cooking under some trees”; “The dancing girl has veiled her body”; “Daughter, along the rim of what you were knitting”; “Even your words will not leave you”; “Hair covered a face”; “I want to boast”; “Like wooden planks from a broken ship”; “The man who grows flowers in a field”; “The moon has gone farming at night”; “My tigers have left me”; “On maps the sea carries color”; “The pigment of crushed petals”; “The season is yet unlit”; “Soil guards the sleep”; “The sun began eating”; “The tree collapsed on itself”; “To the bird an island is not as bright as a star”; “What will you do with these pearls he has given you?”; “Who are you going to meet tonight”; “Why is the forest canopy strung with rope?”; “You disappear beside me in a forest. Walking”; “You curse the rain outside your window, believing”; “You hear the sun in the morning”; “Your lips are as full as a wound”

  DONALD REVELL, Colorado Review:

  “When the strange rain singed the outline of a lake into the sand”

  A Note About the Author

  Daniel Nadler was born in Canada. He is an entrepreneur and directs research at the Global Projects Center at Stanford University. A recent graduate of Harvard University, he divides his time between New York City and Los Angeles. You can sign up for email updates here.

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  Contents

  TITLE PAGE

  COPYRIGHT NOTICE

  DEDICATION

  You hear the sun in the morning

  Your lips are as full as a wound

  A body looks like an unopened bell

  Your arms are as long as sand falling from a cracked fist

  You are as happy as a waterwheel

  My lips are shy

  Ripening spots of white starlight onto our cold blue sphere

  The moon has gone farming at night

  The strawberry she held between her teeth

  I would twist my arms like coral

  I want to boast

  I tugged at your laughter like a rope

  A spider cannot be used as bait

  The wave has come to collect the little ports on the coast

  I hold your hips

  Between kisses the air is quiet

  Even your words will not leave you

  On your back you sleep as if your wings were planted in the sand

  To the bird an island is not as bright as a star

  The gr
ound of the forest has become muddy in the rain

  Love

  This girl’s words are as ordered

  The earth was fruit, and stars, and motion

  You disappear beside me in a forest. Walking

  Color is sleeping in some birds

  What will you do with these pearls he has given you?

  She undressed in the deep shadows of the garden she loved

  Apart from you I am as lost

  When the sun is wide and drying and filled

  The season is yet unlit

  A glacier glows pink

  House, floating under moon

  On maps the sea carries color

  Birds aglow in yellow do not carry ashes

  The star has given me a body

  Soil guards the sleep

  Thick in the forest masks are hung in rows, grinning

  The sun began eating

  By the evening your hair is curled

  Approach shadows like shallow water

  When you slipped off your dress, orders streamed from your lips

  The pigment of crushed petals

  I embraced you by mistake

  Cooking under some trees

  Like the wind that gusts coastal pines toward the water

  I guarded your sleep like a young cat