Heritage

It means I found a home where I was dropped.
The churlish heron
looming on the bridge, keeping stock—
Abandoned summer boats,
in dry docks. Nestled, hull

to hull. Like the sand-soft husks of a walnut.
When you die, I don’t think that I will go. Not even then.

He understands, & the night is infused with violets.

Ringlet

While you were busy
qualifying butterflies. Taking the liminal stretch

of each pinked wing. Fawn is a soundtrack for beauty. Wood nymphs,
meadow browns, ringlets. Jezebels, parchment, pins.

Outside: the sound of the sun
becoming more of what she was—

the velvet slug of their bodies (Nabokov

said they were girls).

But also, I wanted to tell you
there are winds that you won’t own.

There’s a file on you, somewhere—

Stiff corridor, this.

Altered

It’s like the hankering for land, before she touched it.
Balsam axis, where the length

of this occurs. A little stubborn weather
in her system (the perforated flowers,

half moon surge). Now, she stands in doorways,
willing gulls

to rise. Such a sorrow to their efforts. Gale
wings tithing. No

arrive.

Future Trees

Bracelet-ed in the ozone,
they are not here to entertain,
disseminate
leaves.

As if a man is speaking underwater.
You’re owned,
and thus, you’re charmed. 
Quid pro quo. Ever think
for every bird

we’ve bred this terrifying syntax?

Fate Is the Hunter

Blind shoots and restrainer systems.  The procession
is curved, scientifically

proven to help keep your eyes on the rump
of the one in the front. Lest
you have knowledge.

Here’s what I think about knowledge—
At night I take off my blush,
which is pink as meat.  

Louise Mathias is the author of Lark Apprentice (Winner of the New Issues Poetry Prize), Above All Else, the Trembling Resembles a Forest (Winner of the Burnside Review Chapbook Contest), and The Traps (forthcoming, Four Way Books).