17 Psaltery & Lyre: Sarah Dunster, “Recovery”

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Recovery

Walk like a bird of paradise.
Rowdy hips cause the stirring eyes
pain; it goes unnoticed. Belt it
as the poppy pods well up to
blast their kernels far-a blue
sound can’t be lost in a crowd. Sit

on a thousand-foot ledge, dangling
bare longings. You lost that knee-high
when breezes took you, a starling.
Blusters lift wisps of hair as you try
to rip that breast open, scatter drops
to melt the winds that never stop-

jalapeno evenings fizzle
and steam in the citrus drizzle
of cumulus mops passing themselves
back now, over ruddy vistas.
You’re itching. You stoop low and delve.
You get your hands red. You’ve kissed a

wolf before; his black lips curled out
showing yellow bone splinters stuck
there in his eely gums. So shout
jubilant songs to turn your luck.
Tuck red feathers behind your ear
and wait for pumice dust to clear.

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Sarah Dunster is an award-winning poet and fiction writer. Her poems have been published in Dialogue: a Journal of Mormon Thought, Segullah Magazine, and Victorian Violet Press. Her short fiction piece, Back North, is featured in Segullah‘s Fall 2011 issue. Her first novel, Lightning Tree, was published in April 2012.

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