A Portrait of Captured Wind

 

The brightly-hued sails of boats leaving

the harbor overlap inside my vision.  They merge

into mobile art, each curve an elaborate ribbon

of road to an undiscovered location.  Direction

changes, they collapse inside themselves

for a moment,

a breath.

I hold

mine, waiting

for the inevitable expansion, the replosion

of fabric straining against mast, attempting

to control a natural force in order to share its flight.

Hearing Sanity

 

The silent cacophony of the beach

at sunrise is my center

of solace.  Erupture

of waves slowly erodes

the pressures of the previous

day.  Crunch of sand and shell

echo the progression, my mind

moving towards semblance of peace.

I face the golden orb as it breaks

through cover of midnight

cloud, open my mouth

to praise.  Lone seagull

interrupts.  I allow it to speak

for me as I exit, prepared, once again

to face reality’s blight.

I Lie at the Water’s Edge

 

in order to touch two worlds I do not understand.

One whispers in waves of destruction, pushes

me back while devouring the ground beneath me.

The other rages in electric bursts of sound

that have shaken me numb, erased my ability

to decipher junk from gems, bombarded me

with banality until I can no longer see any

line of propriety.  I am manifestation of point,

a crossing plane they battle against.  I have no favored

victor.  I fully understand I am a pawn being moved

along overlapping boards of despair.  I am simply

sacrifice, waiting to be slain.

A.J. Huffman has published seven solo chapbooks and one joint chapbook through various small presses.  Her eighth solo chapbook, Drippings from a Painted Mind, won the 2013 Two Wolves Chapbook Contest.  She is a Pushcart Prize nominee, and her poetry, fiction, and haiku have appeared in hundreds of national and international journals, including Labletter, The James Dickey Review, Bone Orchard, EgoPHobia, Kritya, and Offerta Speciale, in which her work appeared in both English and Italian translation.  She is also the founding editor of Kind of a Hurricane Press. www.kindofahurricanepress.com