Alexander Etheridge

The Unself

I want to break myself 

into a thousand parts.

I want to cut my soul into endless

pages fine and

transparent as newborn butterfly wings.

I want to be ground into

strange dust, each grain

glowing and

vast—And in these terrible

divisions, I’ll be infinitely

expanded, with stained-glass eyes

opened, watching each

turn of night and redfire of day—I’ll be

at last alive, outside of time,

multiplied and microscopic, then

incorporeal and everywhere.

Strange Flowers

   —after Tom Waits

In that deep uncanny

world, dark blue clouds

ride low,

raining all night—

The crowded metropolis

is long hushed.

Everyone there is

an orphan leaving behind

their opulent palaces.

They’re all out

on the stormy streets, roving

and wordless.

Black ivy

grows over empty chapels

where crows fly in

through broken stained glass,

nesting in the high

rafters.  Hooded figures kneel

in flooding gutters,

with their snakes

and torn prayer books.

And flowers never seen before

grow up through

cracked concrete

in ruins of the great

city

where every sound

but the rain

is extinct.

Eight Unfinished Letters

Meet the beginning at the end, as dust

covers your dreams.

❃

A word opened

the first eyes.

❃

The first word was a bloodcall,

as the last shall be.

❃

This dust everywhere falls

from the hushed cities of Heaven.

❃

Ocean after ocean turns

into bones and black salt.

❃

My story becomes your own—

Dark train tracks circling in infinity.

❃

Every word is a question—

What will become of us

❃

I’ve left too much unsaid—but take heart,

nothing ends and we’re never alone.

Black Moon Orchid

It’s yet to be seen by a human eye

but it’s there

leaning in the dark

and living for

damp shadows of

a midnight

swamp

Cloaked in nightfog it goes unwatched

But if you find it

let it be

Its fine edges

are delicate as

tips of a falling

snowcrystal

In its sacred world it only sleeps

Its beauty is fed

by dim shimmers

of a pulsar

It is elegant

as old cathedral

stained glass

Let it breathe and let it go unnamed

Let it go

as if it were

only a vision

born of visions

in realms of

the deep earth

Hell is the Heart

We know how each moment

can shred us,

and that our hungriest

enemy is

deep inside us,

behind veils of blood.

Hell is

our shadow.

Hell is drowning

in snow,

or being cut by

the fingernail moon.

Our suffering

is feeling our suffering

won’t end.

Hell is pain

with no light—

Loss after loss,

a grinding in

the soul

like a wasting disease,

or tiny razors

in our cells.

Hell is a frostbitten

bedroom, or a fire

in a baby crib—

It’s a turned back,

or a cold

hand.  Hell

is you and I

sentenced to

the dark life, the only one

we’ve ever known.

Day’s End Invitation

See now

dusk comes on

with its raft of thoughts

Time is a crucible

Elm shadows

grow over elms

and everything is linked by

dismantlement   

Watch the sundown with me

There’s a glow

and there are shadows

woven inside it

As stars begin appearing

our minds take flight

and our oldest questions become

a delicate thread of

silences

Our prayers

sound like leaves blowing over the roads

Walk with me

past the border of words

into a lost forest

Look around

meet the dark behind moonlight

and meet the light

behind it all

A Brief Explanation of Our Lives

   —after Federico Garcia Lorca

In the roots of the cemetery

black star blood grows

colder

under March wind

In the old olive grove

where thin coyotes

roam

all the leaves grow still

Far off in the city

rats wander through

columns

of dark light

The grief of oceans

finds wildflowers of the

cemetery

in their ancient kingdoms

where lightning flashes

through echoes

Worlds

live on until they perish

in light-swallowing fire

These are the days we know

folding

like Chinese fans

This is the night we know

born from the soil of

graves

behind the old cemetery gates

Alexander Etheridge has been developing his poems and translations since 1998.  His poems have been featured in The Potomac Review, Museum of Americana, Ink Sac, Welter Journal, The Cafe Review, The Madrigal, Abridged Magazine, Susurrus Magazine, The Journal, Roi Faineant Press, and many others.  He was the winner of the Struck Match Poetry Prize in 1999, and a finalist for the Kingdoms in the Wild Poetry Prize in 2022.  He is the author of, God Said Fire, and the forthcoming, Snowfire and Home.