Spring 2016, Volume 20

Poetry by Michael Lavers

Republic

A country bird's abandon when it rains.
Rivers flowing backwards, jungles empty,
a mountain people buried on the plains.

Elegies are outlawed. Fear explains
why soldiers give up on diplomacy,
in a country birds abandon when it rains. 

Crickets click against the empty trains.
The moon goes out; only the blind can see
a mountain people buried on the plains. 

Viruses unfurl in the veins
as quorums of mosquitoes oversee
a country birds abandon when it rains.

The new horizon’s crooked. No one complains:
sunsets last much longer and are free.
A mountain people buried on the plains

dissolves as time takes root in their remains.
Too late. The future never used to be
a country birds abandon when it rains,
a mountain people buried on the plains.

 

 

 

BIO: Michael Lavers' work has recently appeared in Arts & Letters, West Branch, The Hudson Review, Best New Poets 2015, and elsewhere.