love is a fast river

where we fold into each other

not knowing if we will drown,

or together become a jeweled fish

and break free of this dark water-sky.

gasping for air

we kick and splash, 

knowing death swims deep on us.

where grace prevails, there is a silver turn

there we become the water, the sun, the blue sky, 

and the spackled light shadows 

that shifts across smooth brown stones. 

these skin fragile bodies we share

mark the movement of things. 

they are merely water, coming and going.

in them runs the truth of the river.

and it swims on forever.

Marc Anderson – 2018

Fat Hands Publishing

the farmer is dead.

these are perilous times

but that has always been the case.

life’s fragile agreement

lies at our feet, 

unambiguous

meter and melody

reassemble infinitely in pure shapes

struck from a towerless bell

within the house

of this antiphonal chorus

a shade of sorrow anoints each voice

this is not the first

or the last beginning.

the slow seeds,

love’s original messenger,

have gone deep now.

in covenant with the dark earth

they are dreaming

songs of the next future.

somewhere still, always 

the sun gleans solid ice 

to relive a tear, a stream, then an ocean

river’s memory, longer than time

knives blood and stone

to yield a tender shoot.

we will all be there,

our soft spare faces,

as children once more.

the fragile primrose

our collective totem.

we need not visit the

missed direction of regret.

there is no heroic cadence.

the soil of future plenty

asks first, the blessing

of our honest grief

we are not the first

or the last beginning

Marc Anderson – 2021

Fat Hands Publishing