“Towards
the Separation of Fine from Coarse,”
from
the series Separations in the
Silence,
image
by Sue Burickson
3 Piths
In the pith of
afterdays
snow-pocks
wind-scatter
lint-retrieval
doleful read-out
candor quaint
customs
remembered in sketch
deflections
without conviction
revived
by plans for the yet-to-be
the
present so hard to imagine
In the pith of a
diamonded terroir
to
dig illicit
trust-famine
cracked
earthworks rust
gum-gucked
walls ooze
adobe
crumbles
angular
shovels warp
the
arms of the shovelers
tied
lips
white from thirst
terse
from unspeaking
tight-eyed
gleam
relinquish
escape
contortion
ash-crawl
in the pith of
wrack
ruin-ation
post-partum
obsequies
still
born
afterbirth
gory grisly gulp
run
amuck
rumi-nation
jimmy
up
crank
open
the
crack
fingers
cross for
another
run-through
laugh
at ephemera, wear purple
bellow
or pray
bridge
the mirror
eyes
rivet
—Mary
Newell
