Congratulations to Martha Landman, winner, September 2021 Poem of the Month, as selected by 2021 FSP Anthology editors Louise Nicholas and Judy Dally.
After the Cremation
by Martha Landman
I polish the copperplate, sing laments to your ashes
until the earth questions the rain, persecuting it
for the myth of peaceful words in a lifeless land.
I’m an empty-handed sailor in a foreign port.
We converse in sign language. I tell your ashes
the nut trees are dry, the pump is broken, the ostrich
next door had two chicks. I tell them there are days
when even the sea is quiet, unfamiliar with its own undercurrent.
I tell them my heart is a windmill in the wilderness, a lake,
and a preposterous field of sun-red amaryllis. I tell them
there are times when the zebras in the backwoods
each has a different snort to let you know
of predators in the underbrush. I tell them horizons can be
further away than you thought, wider than the arms
of a universal god, lonelier than the imposing skeleton
of a leadwood tree on the African plains. I tell them
you are a song sharper than the whistling thorn tree.
I put on my dirt sandals, cut my hair with pruning shears.