In Finity Quiddity
When does it begin—
the last leaf fall—green tips,
vermillion stem, the speckle
and rot? What choice do I have?
This is the love of my life, I say,
but do I really know? What about
the other life, the one left
by the cul-de-sac, blown out tires
resting on wheel rims. kudzu
clogging the window frames, the dog
flea-bitten and listless chained
in yard-mire. Or my life in Malibu—
the Wi-Fi, facelifts, manicures,
six lanes, veal and caviar. Did I tell you
about my years in the circus, the way
lions lick their paws and clouds
of flies drone under the big-top?
Or in the Midwest, how I hightail it
on the cultivator trying to read
my economics book while I drive
with one hand? How I rush home
to slop the pigs and birth a few lambs
before the red sun dives
behind dark hills.
What have I missed?
What am I forgetting?
• • •
In Praise of You
after Dorothea Lasky, “Poem to an Unnamable Man”
In praise of the fireball that is you hurtling across the sky
which has just now begun to catch fire but I dare not look away—
even though the sparks you are shooting make
little scorch marks on my face.
You are some kind of angel but not heartless after all
not tonight although I might scream
like an amusement park screams,
spill and split like stars darting out of your path
the way your blues have taken off my clothes
and woods smell after dark—
the way owls carry off a meal in that soundless way
only feathers can carry,
or fission and fusion huddle in a field of violets
and hamsters do it doggy style.
I want to spend you like a Rockefeller
the same way bourbon neat goes down burning
and streetlights blur through my lashes
when I squinch my eyes almost but not quite shut
and there might be a tear or two caught between the lashes.
Come morning, mist is on the loose
and you blow my fuse because everyone knows
the toaster and microwave can’t be on at the same time.
My heart might flutter like a bird but it still looks
like a giant strawberry on my MRI.
Even now goose bumps rise to the surface of my skin
and outside snow wheels and eddies,
cherry trees blossom in the middle of winter.
• • •
I Caught a Poem
in a butterfly net but it was so hot it
burned a hole, plunked down
on my toe and set my nail polish on fire.
All I wanted was something ethereal blue
as a bug-zapper or something about
a gibbous moon lurching its way
between clouds that were raining
on my midnight parade. I wanted
a poem devoid of irony—full of sweet
nothings, dancing the Charleston
while a porno movie was flickering
on a screen in the background
without getting stuck on one frame
and scorching with a whiff of burning tires.
I was hoping for chrysanthemums and lilacs,
virgin nipples with pale pink aureoles
not the orange and black kind with wings
that go screeching through damp foliage.
I desire dahlias and sunflowers—
butterflies alighting on the shoulders
of plump babies, snow forming
a thin crust of ice and clouds shaped
like breaching whales—a poem that speaks
volumes about love and loss
and the inevitability of death.
• • •
Anthem
You and I are alike. Today
someone said we look alike
and we laughed. We are both human!
We look into each other’s eyes
and see art. We listen to each other talk
and hear music. When we eat
each other’s cooking we get full.
To me, you are a strawberry bed
or a garden of mint and violets.
On the day of our engagement
we spread a blanket in an alfalfa field.
We made love naked under wind-whipped sky.
The farmer and his two strapping sons
waited until we were finished
to drive up on their tractor to tell us
to get off their property. That’s what
I remember—that and the smirks
on his sons’ faces. Now
when I make love to you
I think of that alfalfa field rich
with bees and the scent of summer.
You are my alfalfa and omega.
Now that we are old we spread fig jam
on Puglisi toast from Trader Joe’s,
keep a well-stocked larder,
and every year we buy blue jeans
in a larger size. If you die first,
I will begin to die. I will stagger
when I walk, stammer when I talk,
and choke on my polenta. Because night
will be desolate without you
I will fill my bed with lilies.
• • •
Dale Champlin is an Oregon poet with an MFA in fine arts. She is the editor of Verseweavers. Dale has published in VoiceCatcher, Willawaw Journal, The Opiate, CatheXis Northwest, Pif, San Pedro River Review, and other journals. In 2019 her first collection, The Barbie Diaries, was published with Just a Lark Books. Callie Comes of Age was published in 2021 with Cirque Press.