Adam Day ~ Five Poems

OFF THE PAGE

Finding a way
and life. Web

of soil, words
just nature’s

bird silent
body; petrel

fly­ing underwater.
From sink to river

we go quietly.

~

SOMEWHERE AND NOWHERE

Planning but settled,
and close – transit

rooms, rain windows,
num­ber­less rooms, making

too many sen­tences. I
start­ed them with I;

I‑time press­es the stalk;
come the walls.

~

BREATHING BEYOND

We stripped
off brine

in snow slush
a light riding

out ahead, smokers
walk­ing alone

leop­ard seal
coarse beach

in silence
to go back

where they
came from.

~

DROPPING AWAY

Car stop; beat­en sky
and sweat edge.

Something set me
gone, a fist to the ear,

blood and tun­nel steam.
Cheek to hood, seeing

a spar­row bathe in curb gravel.
You can’t do nothing,

do noth­ing.

~

SKY ACCIDENT

Earlier marched
died, some slit

and absurd. Night
runs. Cottonwoods

count­ing breaths.
Ruin graf­fi­ti: This

is my name – I existed.
Want is reason;

speech comes.

~

Adam Day is the author of Left-Handed Wolf (LSU Press, 2020), and of Model of a City in Civil War (Sarabande Books), and the recip­i­ent of a Poetry Society of America Chapbook Fellowship for Badger, Apocrypha, and of a PEN Award. He is also the edi­tor of the forth­com­ing anthol­o­gy, Divine Orphans of the Poetic Project, from 1913 Press, and his work has appeared in the APR, Boston Review, Denver Quarterly, Volt, Kenyon Review, Iowa Review, and else­where. He is the pub­lish­er of Action, Spectacle.