Three Poems by Dah

Cicadas Coyotes Future

Sounds from the day have died
but the meaning
is still here.  The future does not
reject this,
does not block the view

Birds have tied themselves
to perches, wings
tucked under, eyes inward,
songs put away

There's an endless drone
of cicadas,
their hard wings
are night-buzzers vibrating

Dew quells the desert dust.
The cicada's noise
is like a high-voltage storm
and with an old-world sound
coyotes voice their opinion


Forevermore

The light has eyes
the light has ears
we are eternally dead

The dark has teeth
the dark has blood
we are eternally dead

The sky has hands
the sky has voices
we are eternally dead

The wind has bellies
the wind has hunger
we are eternally dead

The earth has feet
the earth has lips
we are eternally dead

The rocks have breath
the rocks have shoulders
we are eternally dead

The rivers have lungs
the rivers have fingers
we are eternally dead

The sand has ears
the sand has toes
we are eternally dead

Silence has words
silence has hearing
we are eternally dead


Seeds

Seeds milk the sun's tit
ingesting heat,
seeking roots
moisture, depth,
splitting rocks
upon formation

If you hold a seed with roots
you'll become a grounding rod
There are no words for this:

lets call it, beginning.  No,
lets call it, in the beginning dark
composed us

therefore, Desire is a floral
intimacy:  a fruit
bursting forth, like a verb,
the tree shakes, an apple falls,
sparrows take the sky with wings
of evolution:  crawling

like a root, a legless reptile,
suggestive as the apple
and from this, the original bruise

Dah's sixth poetry collection is The Opening (CTU Publishing, 2018) and his poetry has been published by editors from the US, UK, Ireland, Canada, China, Singapore, Spain, Australia, Africa, Poland, Philippines and India.  His poems have recently appeared in Straylight Magazine, Otoliths, The Cape Rock, Acumen Journal, Sandy River Review, Indian River Review, and Junto Magazine.  Dah lives in Berkeley, California and is working on the manuscript for his ninth poetry book.  He is Pushcart Prize nominee and the lead editor of The Lounge, a poetry critique group.  Dah's seventh book is forthcoming in July 2018 from Transcendent Zero Press, with his eighth book forthcoming in November 2018 from Stillpoint Books.