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Francine Walls
NOVELIST & POET
The Folly
and studying Chaucer in Swansea with students from Llanelli or Carmarthen or Merthyr Tydfil, I would hear the cleaning woman who chatted...
Samples of Stitching April 8, 1935
Her expertise shines in examples of the French seam, the hemmed felled seam, the mitered corner and the bias facing. Each sample pinked...
Farewell
I am turned to ash I want you knowing that I hear your footfalls in the ancient forest, the scream of hawks, the water crazy-mad flowing...
Denial
That momentary disengagement Like the clutch in the old Dodge I think: I have to get a message to her Then: how can I get a message to...
Scarcity
thieves in the neighborhood at 2 A.M. Thieves testing every door looking for unlocked cars, sheds, basements, things left outside, things...
New Year’s Eve
A cake her father bought her mother – always on the frosting the shape of a clock with the hand five minutes to midnight for the New...
Every living thing
Every living thing. #desert #love #water
Jack London’s Beauty Ranch, Glen Ellen, Sonoma Mountain
I sat so still thinking of him that a wren landed on my head thinking I was a statue, perhaps, a place to stand and survey the land for...
In the dream
There is no end to the darkness above my face – the darkness, moonless and without stars. Below me, a small mound of palest light fits...
Childhood
The Ice-Cream Man in the little truck playing “Bicycle Built for Two” speeds up as I run out of my house wallet in hand with ice-cream...
At the Poetry Festival
The drums come from the back of the band the rhythm Jamaican the poet drifts to the microphone: “I killed a cowboy today I didn’t...
Wing Span
In this sweet curve of time we fly south, over the up-lifted earth of the Sierra Nevadas, gray-green forests brown where fire touched...
Alki Point, Minus Tide
c. FEWalls Amanda runs through the shallow waves in her pink sun-suit and rubber boots, yelps as she holds a crab, its single pincher...
Wing-Beat in the Grand Canyon of the Colorado
You have said your good-byes like prayers, used to the words on your lips; your child has the shape of your eyes, but the shade of...
Apricot Moon
Ignition on, the key worn down almost straight now, on the dashboard, a pack of Camels lying on maps among rock samples and tufts of...
Prism
tosses off colors, swirling, a flutterance – no thought of loss or want or farewell, brilliance for a shilling or a dime or naught...
Transformation
You are trapped in the gyre, drifting in the ocean without oxygen in a mass the size of Texas. You can escape. Lean close. You must throw...
Communal Life
The cherry trees shake out their fullness the buds all in bloom now absorbing the sound of the blue day. The photographer must be quick...
Migration
The crescent moon cradles Venus, you who have flown south south-east; I wave a scarf at the horizon where you disappeared. The flute...
Emergency Poem
c. FEWalls This is the poem to carry with you for emergencies, like the spare batteries and extra gas you pack when you drive into the...
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