Elan Mudrow
Smidgens
The Ocean Welcomes Me Back
She knows me.
Though, I haven’t seen
All that she is…..
All her anger and angst
Frozen at times, treacherous.
I know her
From the safety of my footing.
She can pull me, She pulls me, I am pulled
Not by ebb, but by longing
A craving for our meeting.
She allows me to see her.
I am but painted doll
Easily tripped into a fall.
We are cyclic, together.
Friends as we are
I see her placid face
Fierce, reflecting sky.
Her cheeks aged, rippled
As they were at the beginning.
She’s my crone
My witch of calm
Curled slightly
With wavy hair
Rebelling,,,,,
The straightening of her tides.
Her voice, mesmerized magnetic
To my metal ears.
Grounded by emotion
She nudges me
To a rhythm depth tone.
My womb vibrates
With her motion
At the same time
I am her birth.
Her movement is mine
I am she, like her,
The invertebrate
With liquid body
Skin of whatever color
You wish to call me
We are deep in wrappings
Around dense mineral
Earthen cultrate creatures
Terrestrial mud makers
That simple creation act
Pottery, clay, and figure
Shaped by moisture
Solidified by solar storm.
I feel like she is forever
Whose depths
I know by kindred.
We raise our spirits
(For me, this once)
To mist and cloud
Transform, evaporate
Until our salt
Is yanked from our souls
And we fall
To new fawns
of phosphorescence
If I were to say
“Listen to her”
You would have
Already heard
Come at a Price
The amount of alcohol in her drink.
The loudness of her laugh.
Soft shirt sleeves, brushing raw, coded skin.
Tender angst made her…
Makes her
Voice rise
Like dinnertime restaurant dishes.
All she said, forgotten.
All she would have said, remembered.
The High Lakes
The high lakes, frozen, clear,
Distort reflections of the mountain.
Old men with trekking poles
Filter through the forest.
All with some form of Achilles
And Homeric hunger pangs.
Drawn to recite soliloquies
To the unmoving cold.
Return to the parking lot
To winter tires and snow chains.
Alice
She sets a folded towel upon cool sheets, her ass makes a depression on the mattress.
Silence is never a full-proof method of understanding each other, even if hands are involved.
They touch, then they talk. Talking is never a full-proof method of…
His leg dangles off her bed. She gets up, opens the closet door.
There’s a mirror attached to the back of the closet door. She sees my reflection and doesn’t know it’s her. She touches the mirror, thinking, as she always has, that it will lead somewhere.
She leaves fingerprints.
.
The Town That Fell Into The Sea
The ocean hides, sitting low like the winter sun.
Its sound seeps through knolls
Through sand, vine, and footprints
Through trees rooted in confused snarl
Threading lightly between our anonymous hands
Our faces washed away
Until the lights of Highway 101
Reattach themselves to the coast range.
(Photo: Reflection from Tillamook Bay, during the oncoming night in the fog)
Above Multnomah Falls
This warm winter makes the creek scream like spring.
I dip my hand in, as far in as my long sleeves let me
Smooth stones, slick, cold life, years in my hands.
My fragile blood beats, knows the water by heart.
It’s good to be wary of the speed of the current
where it licks up upon the shore, sure feet are never a given.
It can bite you, gently, or with unforgiving teeth.
Its noise covers all voices, who’ve come beyond the falls
I head for snow level, it’s high for this time of the year.
Pine needles dot its surface like a mild sprinkling of spice.
Towhees, ravens, and buntings call with haunting songs
An echo between their voices, moves with the forest, downhill.
There, below, near the river and I-84, the creek is a maiden jumping.
Thousands of selfies, one tripod, a few point and shoots
attempt to catch her in the act of hitting the ground.
She refuses to pose.
The Wind Chases Feral
The wind is amplified by the valley.
A sign, to go no further.
This wind searches ravines, ravages tops of evergreens, escapes up through mountains, lets loose upon a cold sky.
A harsh exhale, a winter bite, snickering past sunrise, diving into sunset, searching for the ocean.
She knows it. It’s a part of her.
She rides…runs. Her scent slips ahead of her.
Then, a lull, a hush, which become wishes, thoughts of the dullness of heat, of a soft warm glow, a purr between rattling storm windows, a cup of soup.
But these are old memories and she’s not sure they’re a part of her like the wind.
Here, she knows she’s one with dead leaves, the falling of rain, the touch of snow. She’s been here forever or so it seems.
But cold is cold. She’s argued with storms more times than she can count. And she must sleep.
The night is a shifty creature.
She lies upon a bed of ferns, pulling dirt, leaves, moss over her body, a live burial, her ritual, to hide from the wind, to become the wild dark. That’s the only way to become invisible.
Her fingers ache.
Tomorrow, she thinks. Tomorrow when the wind dies and the sun stings the forest, she will find her way.
Home.
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