Evolution

by: Leila Bilick

I.

Each April, I walked among crushed tulips
after the last snow
and headstones for fallen soldiers,
my favorite for James Miller, last of the Minutemen,
“I am too old to run,” inscribed in the stone.
I imagined him falling to his knees
delivering himself, negating himself
as the red storm blew in.  

Fauré’s Requiem

By MAxima Kahn

The deer are here, four of them, all does, strolling through the underbrush, munching the tender leaves, picking clean the lowest branches of my flowering pear tree. It has been so long since they have spent time here in the daylight, I am glad to see them and watch their elegant dance among the trees.

I don’t go out on the porch this morning so as not to disturb the deer—and also because it is chillier. I sit inside and listen to Fauré, who takes my breath away with the beauty and perfection of his music. If I could write music like this but relevant to now, if only I could do that, be in that state of grace, what a gift and blessing and offering that would be. I would have to know that was worthwhile, that was enlarging the world, that was magnifying, in a sense, the glory of God, of creation.

The Annual Under-Winter Assault

by: beth Oast Williams

Already it’s rained too much. Water
pools at the base of the pecan tree
and her leaves pull hard, begging
to dive in. Mama tries to hold them, tight
by the toes, so they won’t fall.

Goðafoss

BY: Jennifer Harvey

She heard them, before she saw them. Felt the tremor in the soles of her feet, as the energy shuddered through her. And when she turned around, there they were. Horses. Too many to count.

She watched them ford the river at a shallow point where the rocky bed was visible, their snorts as wild and free as the rush of the water, and the sight of them frightened her. Something about the movement—the ripple and flow of their manes, the sound of hooves on rock, the way the tension in the muscles was so visible, and the whites of their eyes so emphatic—seemed to slow time and silence everything. All she could do was stand there, in that improbable hush, unable to move.