Willawaw Journal Spring 2025 Issue 20

Race to Horizon

–after Wassily Kandinsky’s “Lyrical” (Rider on Horse), 1911

the pitched field
and looming
clouds

sculpt

the rider
in this heat
the green arch

of his back like a
frightened cat and sun
bright boots clutching the horse’s

creamy flanks ‌     man ‌   thoroughbred
and observer all a chroma trance stretched

stretched outside ourselves‌      shuddering in
elongated basso thunder collisions‌      pummeled

arrhythmia‌     unrooted hooves‌     breakneck vanishing
earth   ungrounded‌     undulating‌     quaking‌     as one

we barrel off the ridge‌     crest erupting mane‌     like pounded

black piano keys‌     pounded spirited loins‌     ache-gorged breath-
lessness‌    quavering at full gallop‌     over the brink‌     closed-eyed

David A. Goodrum is the author of Vitals and Other Signs of Life (The Poetry Box) and Sparse Poetica (Audience Askew). Recent publications include Gyroscope, The Midwest Quarterly, Soup Can Magazine, The Main Street Rag, Skylight, among others. David lives in Corvallis, Oregon. See more at www.davidgoodrum.com.

Behind the Garage

A coyote under hopbush:
Juniper-misted, a little fur shining
Off a growing moon—
Very still, watching
As I gather a handful of wood
(been gone all day).
The night hums, throbs really,
Of insects, vibrates high
From the tops of pinyon,
Then low as
The prone pads of prickly pear.
Between me and that wild dog
Light shimmers on dirt
From a spike of moon.
The coyote stares at me,
Alert, then pads between
Cholla, and quiets the night.
I carry wood
Toward the house.

Benjamin Green is the author of eleven books including The Sound of Fish Dreaming (Bellowing Ark Press, 1996) and the upcoming Old Man Looking through a Window at Night (Main Street Rag) and His Only Merit (Finishing Line Press). At the age of sixty-eight, he hopes his new work articulates a mature vision of the world and does so with some integrity. He resides in Jemez Springs, New Mexico.

Skagit Valley Agricultural Mural, 1941

‌            William Cumming Museum of Northwest Art
‌                         La Conner, Washington

You who have wielded the maul these eighty-odd years,
your work boots leaden below bent knees

you may set it down.

And you heaving the milk can—your bowed back must ache.
Set it down.

The stooped farmer may rise and the milker
may return the cows to pasture.

You who worked through so many Sabbaths,
through wartime and the stormy peace that followed

it’s time to rest.

Your grandchildren now plant
gardens of yarrow and milkweed,

nostalgic for the cows they never milked,
for sparrow song and dung-scented earth,

alarmed by sudden fires and fearsome storms
you never dreamed they’d face.

Lost Art of Mending

–after Eavan Boland

Beside her newspapers and brandy,
my mother sits under the lamplight
hemming a skirt or letting it down,
sewing a button on my father’s shirt,
darning the ladders that open on her
heavy stockings. Later we would thread
her needle, a diver into the river
of fabric on her lap. Her granny must
have taught her to sew, the art perfected
those lean years of her teens, frugality
stitched in for life.

‌                            It’s not completely lost:
I taught myself to darn, making a small
nest of crisscrossing thread, saving
a favorite pair of socks from the dead.

Suzy Harris was born and raised in Indiana and has lived her adult life in Portland, Oregon. In 2023, she published a chapbook called Listening in the Dark (The Poetry Box) about her journey through hearing loss and learning to hear again with cochlear implants.

Celestial Bodies

—after “Thirteen Women in the Volcanic Eruption” by Judith Baca, 2021
‌                   las mujeres unidas jamás serán vencidas

We are sky.
Thirteen strong, we are the day, the night.
Thirteen women. Eyes fixed high,
we follow sky sister, heed
her warnings, her changing moods.

We are heart.
Sister heart breathes, guides,
teaches. Blood sacrifice is red, real.
We pulse forever.

We are volcano’s daughters.
Our long hair ascends to wrap volcano’s mound,
envelop her black lava, caress her fury.
We stand on her river of satin, weave ribbons of color.
We are river. Our womb bleeds red, blue, golden yellow.

We are life.
Our hands open to birth, make ready for labor.
Hands form a triangle, lotus of renewal.
One hand swears truth on one brown breast.
Another pulses, senses spirit, reads the omens.
One hand forms a fist, protests, protects.
Hands welcome, hands heal, hands teach.

We are tree trunk legs. With them we walk to destiny.
Throats in arrow shape find new words for our mouths.
Lips reflect passion, light from sister sun.
Our faces upturned, thirteen suns shine in the firmament.
Breasts hang fertile, blossoms ready.
Our pelvis, in volcanic darkness, promises new life.

We are thirteen Heart Sisters.
Tlaztolteotl, goddess sister of love,
holds heart as our guide.
With love in hand, thirteen sisters explode together,
on the altar of Madre Tierra,
we give light to the world
we birth hope.

Cuerpos Celestiales

–-inspirado en “Thirteen Women in the Volcanic Eruption” por Judith Baca, 2021
‌                             las mujeres unidas jamás serán vencidas

Somos cielo.
Trece hermanas fuertes, somos día, somos noche.
Trece. Los ojos fijos en lo alto,
seguimos a la hermana cielo, escuchamos
sus presagios, sus cambios.

Somos corazón.
La hermana corazón respira, guia,
enseña. El sacrificio de sangre es rojo, real.
Pulsamos para siempre.

Somos hijas del volcán.
Nuestro pelo largo asciende a envolver el monte del volcán,
a enredarla en lava negra, a acariciar su furia.
Nos paramos en su río de raso, tejemos cintas de color.
Somos río. Nuestro matriz sangra rojo, azul, dorado.

Somos vida.
Abrimos las manos al parto, nos alistamos para trabajar.
Las manos forman un triángulo, el loto renovador.
Una mano jura la verdad sobre un seno moreno.
Otra vibra, siente el espíritu, lee los augurios.
Una mano hace puño, protesta, protege.
Las manos dan la bienvenida, las manos curan, las manos enseñan.

Somos piernas como troncos de árbol. Con ellas caminamos al destino.
La gargantas en forma de flecha encuentran nuevas palabras paranuetras
bocas.
Los labios reflejan la pasión, la luz de la hermana sol.
Las caras arriba, trece soles brillamos en el firmamento.
Los senos cuelgan fértiles, florecitas dispuestas.
Nuestro pelvis, en oscuridad volcánica, promete nueva vida.

Somos trece Hermanas del corazón.
Tlaztolteotl, diosa hermana del amor, extiende el corazón.
Con ella de guía, explotamos juntas,
mientras, con amor en las manos, en el altar de Madre Tierra,
damos a luz a la esperanza.

Devotion to the arts has characterized Maura Harvey’s life. She learned Spanish in her teens as an exchange student in Mexico City. After she obtained a Ph. D. in Latin American literature, she became a teacher of Spanish and published poetry in Spanish in Venezuela: POEMAS appeared in 1993. Her poetry in both Spanish and English has appeared widely in anthologies and journals (especially in California Quarterly and the San Diego Poetry Annual) and she has served on the Editorial Board of California State Poetry Society since 1999. She was a founding member of Taller del mar, a monthly poetry workshop with members from Tijuana and San Diego and has presented solo and group poetry recitals and readings in Tijuana and Tecate, México, San Diego, San Rafael, and Sausalito. She currently lives in Victoria, BC, Canada and San Rafael, California.

Blue Hour

My Father steps off the grassy bank, knee deep
into the chartreuse colored muck and mire,
wearing a wife-beater t-shirt and checkered boxer shorts.
I sit atop his shoulders, my long, tanned legs drape his chest.
I know, without a doubt, the cold chunky mud that rises
past his knees is life threatening quicksand;
I’ve seen many heroes succumb to this gritty ooze
in late night movies.
It’s not like riding my pony; I can’t feel the sinewy muscles
of my Father’s back that signal a change in his pace,
tell me to grip the sides of his barrel chest with freckled knees.
No snaffle bit to direct my Father’s attention straight ahead
or poke the roof of his mouth, asking him to slow down.
Instead, he twists his tall lean body from side to side
as he plows through the sludge, looking back toward the bank,
talking with my Mother, wading deeper toward the skinny line
of pink and orange horizon–the Blue Hour–
where anything could happen! No sun, no stars,
no black vault of night, only azure light above and below.
Perseus might rise from the mud with Medusa’s head in his hands,
eyes like black diamonds, or a chimera with wings,
whipping its snake tail in the air.
I wrap my arms around his face, lay my feverish cheek
against the crown of his head.
God reaches back, pats my head with a veiny, calloused hand;
his long fingers gently tousle my hair.
I open my eyes to see that we have made it
to the mossy green of the pond.
The geese honk and skid across the glassy expanse of water.
The deep, sad hoot of the great horned owl slows my breathing.
And my Father laughs, as he sinks below the surface,
leaving me to tread peacefully, as I search the evening sky for Venus.

F.D. Jackson lives in south Mississippi, along with her husband and sundry furry family members. When she is not writing or reading, she can be found wandering the Gulf Coast with a cold drink in her hand. F.D.’s works have appeared in Anti-Heroin Chic, Rat’s Ass Review, Willawaw, Third Wednesday, FERAL, and others.