SITUATION IN YELLOW

Hypsography

The girl has skinned
her palms, which troubles
her coordinates especially.
                                        So she takes

to far wander, matches
and buttons in her trouser
pockets. These are her
                                        boundary monuments.

She does not take paper
clips or protractors.
At the limits, northwest
                                        is lighter,

her relief-shading held
in mind like the notion
of encrusted poplars.
                                        Overedge

has stopped being a daily
concern—she no longer
questions neatlines
                                        or gradicules.

She learns how to measure
hachure by tread, distance
by breath. She sees
                                        no one,

collects half-tones for pigments
she will never mix.
She waits for subsidence
                                        in land, in body.

__

LAST EVENING OF THE YEAR

Bathymetric Map

                                        The boy leaves
his jacket backshore.
The river is icy—reddish
mood, shed as bench mark.

                                        The leadline
clenched in his left fist.
He knows the meander;
steers to levee as if

                                        sightless. Sounds
with wrist-flick, listens
for the undertow.
Considers the water

                                        level; tide
low. The boat shifts
as he picks up altimeter,
determines the sea.

                                        In his hand
he begins to hear
the bottom—its ridges
and canyons, every

                                        ripple and twitch
a shade he cannot
really reach; only feel
tugging from below.

__

These poems appear in the chapbook In the Particular Particular, the winner of the 2006 DIAGRAM/New Michigan Press chapbook contest. It is published in 2007 by New Michigan Press. Order [here].