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Eddie Dowe
The white moon opens
like a fist unclenching
to lift a baby.
I am but a dying man
but a dying man still lives.
Of course it will rain
when my murder finds me
standing at my door.
I hold a white umbrella,
mouth open like a puddle.
This poem sees nothing;
not the bald head of moon
nor the tongues of stars.
Why should it see anything?
Its poet is a blind man.
The dogwood at night,
the red maple as well
braced in a spring wind.
What death can the child know
surrounded by blooming trees?
Your hair runs like ink.
A dark animal in heat
howls in the garden.
The rain freezes on the grass.
Pull your child closer.
Katsu! Death arrives
like the Buddha in high heels
and a tight black skirt.
I kiss the air around me.
Religion never looked so good.
These words are my will.
Each syllable the breathing
of a cicada.
I leave the shell of this poem
on the mirror of this page.
The grand piano
sleeps on the terrace --
a white leaf of music.
I paint the sky with the sound
of these keys and this woman.
When I am dead
offer me a new name,
open my closed eyes.
I am now the buffalo
eating the stars in a dark field.
Eddie Dowe is a first year graduate student in the MFA program at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, where he also teaches 8th grade English.
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