Selected Poems by John Davis
“Birches Within the Preserve”
Among our vowels the language of leaves
murmurs the way a stream begins and ends
with falling diction, syllables spilled
downhill into the sound. The birches
lean like dozens of brides waiting
for husbands returning from war. The scars
along their bark tell of hard pulse
and what wind can do to love. We fold
our fingers into fingers, marvel at the bleaching,
these carvings of moonlight,
marble-white secrets, fabrics of ghosts
that rise from our spines.
“Good”
Good wine gets men to the communion rail.
It’s good to know that no one eye-bats anymore—
makes you look like you’re having a seizure.
It’s not bad weird or good weird. It’s just weird.
She’s a good cook as cooks go
and as good cooks go, she’s gone.
Rain is good for parched land.
Wind is good for the sail but not the sailor who is snorting coke
off the transom.
Good day means the hunter shot ten mallards;
not-so-good means he shot his dog.
Good job means you didn’t get caught the way you did
last week when you kissed my wife.
A good joke eases ulcers from a teacher.
A good man rubs his lover’s arm before she gives him a handjob.
If it’s good enough for Brady, it’s good enough for me
hums through Inherit the Wind like a wind harp.
If it’s good enough for Slim Shady, it’s BAD, which means it’s good.
He was a good dog. He didn’t hump the hostess
in the first five minutes.
Dick me at Dawn is a good name for a whorehouse
but not the new church.
The tornado was good and drunk stumbling around town.
Jesus-fucking Christ-on-rye the woman screamed.
I’m good and pregnant.
My brother stole my sweater, but I got him back good
when I lit his socks on fire while he was sleeping.
That woke him up.
My bed was good and sick so I had to take care of it.
I’m not good at life. I didn’t study for it.
“Aspen”
The snow cloud has a week-old hangover,
releases a few flakes
It’s all to do with unwashed light
and frozen black water
It’s all to do with the wings of a crow
Winter would open its slippery ice box
if the sun would disembark from the ghost ship
It’s all to do with receding glaciers
and making a face in the wind
It’s all to do with the migration of stars
The cold loiters in someone else’s dream
a born pushover
It’s all to do with vertebrae
and skulls of bare aspen trees
It’s all to do with the chrome of the moon
“Bluesman’s Nightmare”
I was emptying the river’s sunrise
into my canteen—me, a wanted man
on the run for killing a song
with a guitar the way a butcher
hacks up bones with a saw. I wanted to
blow out the candles of my life, but no
time for that; the hounds had picked up
my scent—a love killer who had deserted
his shadow onstage. The dancers, wanting
eight-to-the-bar, were in mid-spin when I
ripped off a run of notes so scattered
even root doctors were scared of my ju ju.
Who was I to shred a fretboard and to voodoo
music? There would be no sympathy
below my gallows, no peace be thine
peace be kind. I ran through rhythms
of wind dodging stumps stilted as monks
in prayer, never stopping to drink the river’s
vernacular, just running, tucking
a black cat bone in my pocket, running wild,
scared as a witch doctor who’s lost his chant,
lost his dance. String me up. Filter the spell
out of the back-alley blues I’ve woven
into a basket and run away with love
the way the dish ran away with the spoon.
“The Language of Dawn”
Morning, morning, why do you hurry
in a murky syllable of birds
Your horizon of pink-chapped lips
your timbre of wind—
your minutes race in red suspense
and burst into blossoms so bright I cannot see
Stop this jabber that hammers
and shatters the night that slept
so softly under the skin
of a dark plum
John Davis
1/31/2021
John Davis is the author of two collections, Gigs and The Reservist. His work has appeared recently in DMQ Review, Iron Horse Literary Review, One, and Terrain.org. He moonlights in blues and rock and roll bands.
