FAST GROWING, SHORT LIVED
Martina Reisz Newberry
Yes...I’ll gather myself in like cut flowers and ask you
how you are and where you’ve been.
—Anne Sexton, “Two Sons”
Because there was a funeral, it doesn’t mean you’re dead.
Maybe you were just tired of living the acquiescent life. Maybe you were
bored with counting hailstones and monkey bones. Maybe your mother
would not stop whispering and whining into the ear of your dreams and
you decided to pay her a visit.
Who knows what darkness lies in the heart of us?
If The Shadow knows, he’s not sharing it with me.
In my chair on the patio and in my cluttered mind, I hold a dark rosary. I
count the olive wood beads
until I run out of time and words. “Holy Mary,
Mother of God…”
Lady, your soul of olive wood, your too-bright face, your strawberry
crevices waiting for my regret—all signs point to “No.”
Just because there was a funeral, it doesn’t mean my
friend is dead.
How could there be a death without rage? See here! There are
Box Elder trees and Black Masses all around and
they do what you expect them to do
which is nothing at all, which is everything at once, which is the
untying of knots and the naming of hearts. They have
explained again and again that my friend has died, passed on,
gone over
the rainbow bridge. Even as she left the crèche
and would not say goodbye, I wrote her into The Gnostic Gospel of
Mary. This all happened yesterday and the day before and the day
before that. Yesterday is all there is. I only borrowed today to set her
bones
into this small boat, this savage canoe.
Chioma Ebinama, Ejima (twins) playing with
good hair, 2019. Watercolor, sumi ink, and thread on
handmade Indian cotton rag paper, 25 × 69 inches,
Image courtesy of Catinca Tabacaru Gallery
Martina Reisz Newberry’s most recent book is BLUES FOR FRENCH ROAST WITH CHICORY, available now from Deerbrook Editions. She is the author of NEVER COMPLETELY AWAKE ( from Deerbrook Editions), and TAKE THE LONG WAY HOME (Unsolicited Press). She is also the author of WHERE IT GOES (Deerbrook Editions). LEARNING BY ROTE (Deerbrook Editions) and RUNNING LIKE A WOMAN WITH HER HAIR ON FIRE: Collected Poems (Red Hen Press). Newberry’s work has been included in numerous anthologies and widely published in literary magazines in the U.S. and abroad. Passionate in her love for Los Angeles, Martina currently lives there with her husband, Brian, a Media Creative..