by Lisa Bickmore
it beats, an urgent stranger
at the door
knocking
heaves within its cage, seized
convulsed
sick with yearning
a vagrant wash of gravel
thrown tumbling
down a slope
accident
of fickle drift
it wants
escape, wants its
voice to open
into ether
strangers
choir to me
this song I once held
in common with them
now, alone
in a back row I’m
broken
to stay and am wild
to go
though ever
have I wandered
from this place
still I am
here,
little hum,
psalm’s selvedge
a fetter, binding
curb
to my bent
momentary beggar
to the searing
to tongues of flame
after “Come thou fount of every blessing”
LISA BICKMORE is the author of three books of poems: Haste (Signature Books, 1994), flicker (winner of the 2014 Antivenom Prize from Elixir Press), and Ephemerist (Red Mountain Press, 2017). Her poems and video work have been published in Tar River Poetry, Sugar House Review, SouthWord, Hunger Mountain Review, Terrain.org, Quarterly West, The Moth, MappingSLC.org, and elsewhere. In 2015, her poem ‘Eidolon’ was awarded the Ballymaloe International Poetry Award. She is Professor of English at Salt Lake Community College, where she teaches writing of all sorts. She is the founder and publisher of the new nonprofit literary press, Lightscatter Press.
Photo: “Ermita San Isidro” by Jörg Bergmann
Psaltery & Lyre 