"The Ring" by Eva Dominelli
Two poems by Geoff Anderson
Sand House
I wrestle with a stubborn lid,
a fizz of sweet yeast
my grandfather’s late breath.
The ocean has not stopped
stirring since he offered the lip
of a conch to me, crow’s feet
dragging to his temples.
Listen. A wave on sand;
a hiss of foam. The bottle cap
clatters in his sink, but where
has my grandfather been
hiding? In his drawers, I find
his bottles folded in fatigues,
his open, toothless jaws.
To bury means to displace
the body and he is everywhere
and missing. Dry urine beneath
bedsheets, an ocean outside
lapping my footprints with
a black tongue. When I hear
glass roll on hardwood,
it must be you, grandfather,
saying you are home,
not asleep but a salted wind
searching the empty lungs
of garbage bags, another stale thirst
crashing in your hands, the way
you had me watch your fist
ensnare the shell and
pitch it back into the sea.
Tonight, I held your necks down
the sink and tides ran through
the screen door, panting.
You who taught the ocean
to be a slur in my ear
were drowned by a faucet’s
burning water, steam and soap
in my palms; I washed you off,
grandfather, your blood
rising through my hands.
a fizz of sweet yeast
my grandfather’s late breath.
The ocean has not stopped
stirring since he offered the lip
of a conch to me, crow’s feet
dragging to his temples.
Listen. A wave on sand;
a hiss of foam. The bottle cap
clatters in his sink, but where
has my grandfather been
hiding? In his drawers, I find
his bottles folded in fatigues,
his open, toothless jaws.
To bury means to displace
the body and he is everywhere
and missing. Dry urine beneath
bedsheets, an ocean outside
lapping my footprints with
a black tongue. When I hear
glass roll on hardwood,
it must be you, grandfather,
saying you are home,
not asleep but a salted wind
searching the empty lungs
of garbage bags, another stale thirst
crashing in your hands, the way
you had me watch your fist
ensnare the shell and
pitch it back into the sea.
Tonight, I held your necks down
the sink and tides ran through
the screen door, panting.
You who taught the ocean
to be a slur in my ear
were drowned by a faucet’s
burning water, steam and soap
in my palms; I washed you off,
grandfather, your blood
rising through my hands.
Pest Control
after Will Evans
The squirrel doesn’t run as I grab the cage--
bristles, widens an eye the sun herds west in.
I set him in the garage before the possums
coalesce with their white wedged skulls
because who wants to be bothered at these
sinking hours. I know when to disappear,
those nights I would throw rocks as a kid,
aiming at the stop sign from the porch.
Once, a softer metal caved like a lung
gasping. I had missed—my father’s car door,
a scar that has not left the handle. If he heard,
my father has never asked what happened.
I watched him apply a brush of touch-up,
step back to see light still bending inside
the dent. Isn’t this why I called pest control,
my own attempt to reclaim what I have
lost? A bedroom quiet enough to hear
the hands shift on the clock face again,
the way my father traced the groove in
some broken hope it would vanish,
the rock nowhere in sight. I have found
guilt to be the fleshy pit of desire. Tomorrow,
they’ll take the squirrel to a patch of forest
he will die in, wondering where he is.
My father’s thumb covers up the nick
each time he opens the driver door.
When I listen for scratches in the wall,
the house settles a little deeper.
The squirrel doesn’t run as I grab the cage--
bristles, widens an eye the sun herds west in.
I set him in the garage before the possums
coalesce with their white wedged skulls
because who wants to be bothered at these
sinking hours. I know when to disappear,
those nights I would throw rocks as a kid,
aiming at the stop sign from the porch.
Once, a softer metal caved like a lung
gasping. I had missed—my father’s car door,
a scar that has not left the handle. If he heard,
my father has never asked what happened.
I watched him apply a brush of touch-up,
step back to see light still bending inside
the dent. Isn’t this why I called pest control,
my own attempt to reclaim what I have
lost? A bedroom quiet enough to hear
the hands shift on the clock face again,
the way my father traced the groove in
some broken hope it would vanish,
the rock nowhere in sight. I have found
guilt to be the fleshy pit of desire. Tomorrow,
they’ll take the squirrel to a patch of forest
he will die in, wondering where he is.
My father’s thumb covers up the nick
each time he opens the driver door.
When I listen for scratches in the wall,
the house settles a little deeper.
Geoff Anderson curated Columbus, OH's first poetry shows for biracial writers (The Other Box), translation (Lingua Franca), and immigration (New World). He’s a Callaloo fellow and his chapbook, Humming Dirges, won Paper Nautilus’s Debut Series (2017). He has work on/forthcoming in Tinderbox, Juked, Southern Indiana Review, and www.andersongeoff.com.
Eva Dominelli is a Vancouver artist and freelance Illustrator with a BFA in Illustration from Emily Carr University of Art and Design. Her mysterious gouache and ink illustrations playfully investigate the relationship between the private and the public experience of the everyday. She is currently working on her upcoming artist’s book Between Being & Nothingness.
You can view more of her work at evadominelli.com, on facebook @evadominelliillustration or on instagram @eva.avenue.
You can view more of her work at evadominelli.com, on facebook @evadominelliillustration or on instagram @eva.avenue.
