Meanwhile there’s this dream
I have of you—
a card game, a maze
of corridors, fingers hidden
behind torsos, a borrowed
kiss, another kind
of numbers played here—
and the song? I wake too soon.
guardian angel
Guardian Angel Dust to Dust
I enter the quiet
life through a seam
in this wall. First time I heard
your voice was a homecoming. Tell me
if ghosts speak. With a pronounced
accent? Is the language
of flowers reserved for them
the way I’ve reserved myself
for what’s left
of you? Memory is seamless.
Georgia One Revisited
To confuse sense
of place with your lap, accidental
falls with the truth
as it comes out when
I’m asleep is to reenter
those dreams I forget.
epicurns.com
A first floor cremation
urn gallery comes to me
in a dream
where I’m riding east—
a river crosser, muse
lover—lusting for a guardian
angel who can’t be
touched. Live human flesh
before me, he must remain
straight ahead, slightly
elevated—never false.
Crooked Spirituality
She knows her guardian
angel is not perfect—
those wings don’t align,
the right one is slightly
bent,
he sometimes squints
when he takes off
over the redwoods
to sail above Big Sur again.
Living Tower
Even if it was an option, it’s not
an option
to date your guardian angel,
even an accidental one. You may believe
you’ve exhausted them all, been pushed
to the edge of the jetty—rocks everywhere
sounding off a raucous
laugh. But the one who guides you ashore
cannot be the one to take you
home
to love you in a half lit, half
darkened solar. This is more
than semantics. This is
a rule bronzed and embedded
in each Noguchi sculpture
you hope to see and know you’ll want
to touch.
You, Conduit
To pretend to be
an atheist and still believe
in guardian angels is
this house
where I live with blinds
closed tight. To profess to live
in solitude by choice
while scars of loneliness tattoo
my legs, my soul, is
to give loners
a bad name, is to let myself
down root
cellar stairs into a leaky chamber
where only humans go.
Guardian Angel with a Blues Harp
—not a lute. Storms
have passed. Acoustic mass
wraps black
and tangles up inside
the brick wall. Some of it will seep
through. More will remain the ivy
of darkness outside
my window. Alone, I risk
the walk outside at night
toward a museum, fuzzed-out
guitar and drums loop
around a gallery
on an upper floor. Alone, I imagine
I will peer over
a cliff, will listen
for human voices amidst the ocean
roar in Big Sur,
will hope to see an otter,
will hope to hear some small sign
that you’re out there watching
over me without knowing
that’s what you do. I keep
my distance—solitude
is my drug
of choice. There’s nothing left to fear.
Water Elixir
Night collapses
into day—the ferry
is free. A frame
for this lake
sky after a May frost
would cost more
than all the gold
in a guardian angel’s halo,
could not capture
the moment I choose
to turn fully around.
Who’s Minding the Gap
No dead chubby child
with wings can help
me now that I suffer
tip of the tongue spells
more than I care
to remember. Myths
recounted in another
language mean as much
to me now that he’s been
pronounced
alive. Departing.
Sounds like (he) fled.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 