Red Calligraphy
The door to the sea
opens under the moon
like the ghost of
words
I wrote to reveal
your understanding
of death’s impasse.
There is a distance
of ships like widows
veiled and unveiled
in the process
of a summer woman.
Between our hands
twists a red
calligraphy
of apple branches
for each year
we served eternal
to love the way
we were made to rise
from wheat and fire.
I will always live
in your life
looking through
this arterial night.
BIOGRAPHY: John Swain lives in Louisville, Kentucky. Crisis Chronicles Press published his most recent chapbook, White Vases.
