by C. R. Resetarits
Diptych: Left Hand, Third Finger
1. Bonnie, Bonnie, Bonnie
Bonnie,
I am your old woman;
I have turned down those lights;
and I am scared to run out of time,
but not yet ready to give up this fight.
Bonnie,
you can blues-slay demons
and keening banshees
to set wee fairies free,
then in 12-bars nimbly play me this blissing.
Bonnie,
please sing our very nick of being
along this hard way we go
in still believing in this living
by your voice, guitar, music mighty precious.
2. Yearn
The blues is pain
is that rag and roll
your raspiness
The ache of angels
moans among sexy romps
you emotionally tangy
A gut-stringed slide is
the human voice crying
through ballads you float
rhythm and grief
in an hourglass fleeting
you woman wise touring my heart
Karla Linn Merrifield has had 900+ poems appear in dozens of journals and anthologies, with 14 books to her credit. Following her 2018 Psyche’s Scroll (Poetry Box Select) is the newly released full-length book Athabaskan Fractal: Poems of the Far North from Cirque Press. She is currently at work on a poetry collection, My Body the Guitar, inspired by famous guitarists and their guitars; the book is slated to be published in December 2021 by Before Your Quiet Eyes Publications Holograph Series (Rochester, NY). Web site: https://www.karlalinnmerrifield.org/; blog at https://karlalinnmerrifeld.wordpress.com/; Tweet @LinnMerrifiel.
C. R. Resetarits is a writer and collagist. Her collage works have appeared in the pages and on the covers of dozens of magazines, as well as several poetry collections. New collages now on the covers of Shooter Magazine (UK) and Cowboy Jamboree(US).She lives in Faulkner-riddled Oxford, MS.