Guest poet: Isabel Chenot

"Water is a chrysalis to hang heaven on a bruised weed..."

photo by the author

dust-blind

The dust smears out the view.
In this brazed valley where the sun
is shocked into
the fume of things, Mountain,
I cannot see you.

But wind or rain will sometimes rarefy
the casings of the air.
And then you'll be so close, so high
and so unmoved, my mind will hardly dare
undaze to verify.



rain on the mown grass

As gentle after snow and ice as rain,
or dew transpired on a stem:
a scent of quenching, and I ascertain
your immanence come

clean around me: the new-mown stubble
has a radiant hue.

Water is a chrysalis to hang heaven on a bruised weed,
so the light can refresh what leans sore after cutting.

Angels whisper peace to pain
on each blade wounded to break or double:
their clear wings dangle in reflected blue.



the almond trees shed their blossoms

The unextinguished drift
could almost hypnotize

as though the orchard
writhes in fluid, under water—

a wave’s chaos heaves light
down

and through.
It’s like a dream I have

where a snow leopard
appears, molting white thunder.

Snowed petals blear my view.
Someone suggesting you

is crowned
with them, like meteors.

(first published in Orchards, July 2024)

Isabel Chenot has loved poetry all her remembered life. Some of her poems are collected in The Joseph Tree, available from Wiseblood books.