Cumberland Island, Late Evening
after H.D.
We forget—discarded
plastic bags mix with
jellyfish, glowing
ghosts below the surface
while to the north lights
of Jekyll and Saint
Simons glitter
galaxies into existence
—this island too has been
bared once by man.
Centuries dredged up
by the Navy
pave these shores
in shark teeth, black as cavities
but doubly sharp
for being fossils, buried
ages, brought to light
with silt that, bleached,
burns pale at dusk.
A trawler guttering
against the current
pulls with it schools of silver,
restless flesh and marshwrack
—brittle grass punctuated
by scraps of stained
linen—woven
in mats drifting
to tide’s edge
as we toss angel wings
back to waves, watch
the water curl in on it
-self and feel
the world return in froth
-ing hush. What constellations there are
mix with cities
on the horizon, indistinguishable
in their reflection below
gulls circling down to roost
—white feathers lifted by wind
-burst and released.
Letter from Atlantis
Before my lungs writhed in salt,
before I knew what it meant
to be filled with something other than self, I saw
the marsh as sky transmuted to mercury
-framed spartina, burnt brown
by September’s waning heat.
Now, I part my lips and only brine spills out
—I choke for words to call
your longing, knowing only how to keep
just beneath the surface, hidden
by that sheen you call light. I cannot break your image
enough to breathe. Is it because I opened myself, I only want you
to find late afternoon sun given back
by rippled inlet? Never mind the fracture you cannot see
—oysters grown from broken ribs,
a dinghy rotting in silt. Only the past tense
of gold lettering remains, its name’s final E D dyeing
white paint cut by razor-sharp shells.
But you prefer the present—waves reclaiming brittle cord
grass and clams crushed by scavengers—you don’t have to see
the tangled net and body
of a gull it suffocated, eyes picked clean
by flies. Its moldering feathers are a lotus bloom in a nest
of marshwrack, remains of a season
you wish could turn. At times, I’ve wondered
if I’m truly lost, buried by a reflection
you’d have consume
the entire field. For you, it would be
enough to know
only the marsh exists,
given form by needlepoint
of reeds, for me to be
illegible beneath waves until lungs burst
for something other than salt. Did you even want
to find me? Still, green
returns eventually, bristling
with language of its own, paled by wind
and shivering.
A Personal History of Camouflage
As a child, I wanted to become bronze
leaves fading
as they fell from water
oaks in the park behind my house. Still green,
I had not yet learned to diminish
silence was enough;
without voice, the stream
by which I played
slid past rusting
cans, exposed roots
while my father disassembled
another car up the hill. I wanted the world to notice
how unnoticeable I could become
beneath alien fir
grown hackneyed
from the base of a poplar,
comfortably disguised in motley
of earth tones, mistaking choice
in disappearance for agency. I settled
for parting hydrangeas
to step out on the lawn—how blue
globes gave way to
body was proof enough.
*
I convinced myself
they could not see me
behind holly. My friends
played along, or truly would not believe
I’d cut myself
on needles to hide, could not
see swollen flesh red
as berries nested
in leaves. I imagined
the heat on my arms
was my flowering—my hands contorting
to white petal-bursts
while feet took root, bare toes
curled in black loam.
But they called and I stood,
cuts no more than runes,
little prayers.
*
I believed absence
an assertion. Swimming the lake I visited
in the summer, I let myself slip
beneath the surface, pretend to forget
keeping myself afloat required breath. Weight
pulled me and I held air, jealously
cradling it
in my chest, let it swell
at confinement
as sun, seeping in tendrils
through water,
materialized on my ghost
-pale body. I wanted
to find a place
where sight and shape ceased
but never could—air pushed
inevitably outward. Acquiescing
to exhale, I defined myself
by ripples, receding.
*
Squirrels rummaged the yard,
the damp remains of dogwoods
in bloom. I sat
on the porch, listened
as each angered at the approach
of another, clasping to
acorns lingering
from last year, and held silence
as they did their winter
store. Behind poplars
and oaks lining the stream,
kudzu threatened to overtake
budding hydrangea. To open myself
would be to let the vines in
to climb from leg to arm,
fill my throat
with gardens
of spadeleaves
rattled by wind
until only the shape of voice
remained. Around me
the world flickered green.
Dan Barton is a poet living in Chicago where he currently teaches writing. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Chicago and an MFA from Texas State University. His work has appeared in such journals as Folio, Sand Hills Literary Magazine, Grist, and Permafrost.
Header photo of Cumberland Island by Stacy Funderburke, courtesy Shutterstock. Photo of Dan Barton by Olivia Kohler.
