The Irises
for Charles Wright
A fly quizzical among tufted causeways,
blue sudden avenues spumed overnight from spears.
O silk, my throat closing around a sob.
That fly again, minute leaden tank, thread-hooves,
busy, busy, to whom I mean nothing.
Relief in this. Yet to me he’s singing beside the dugout, the ditch,
cosmic with pathologies. A grave matter,
that perfume—father, mother, son, & daughter—
those phrases—no hands, no feet, how else depart,
eyes opened without ceasing—
why I can’t disturb their bruised hymning,
why I gather them all inside, until I’ll know—
—Lisa Russ Spaar
—found in Vanitas, Rough (2012)