Reservoir Gods
1.
We will meet in the afternoon
when the air is flavored with cardamon.
We will drink to the lamp that lights us.
2.
Anchors moor ships and have curved parts.
We will hear the ship’s creak and sailors’ voices
like echoes in a cavern.
3.
Lamps dim with faint light.
The earthmover will nod its head.
We will glow like red ants,
like far away beacons, like
a diamond ring lost in a storm.
4.
The earthmover toyed
with Slide Mountain.
Grasshoppers gathered
in a circle on emerald moss.
5.
Myles was afraid of Easter Island
but studied the statues diligently.
Stan saw eagles fly over Slide Mountain
and thought they were reservoir gods.
6.
Everyone’s quiet now. Blackbirds eat the lawn.
I don’t know why the tomatoes haven’t ripened.
I caught a harvestman and released him in the garden.
Tim knocked at the side door and invited us to his concert.
A bat squeezed my arm like a blood pressure machine.
7.
You are the rabbit that ran in the garden.
You stared at the throats of those nesting hummingbirds.
You were the rabbit that screamed at the knife.
I took the knife and threw it in the river.
You swam from the poisoned well.
You ate golden apples picked from phantom trees.
The orchard was forgotten as you burned every field.
I stood in the archway and imagined I saw you.
8.
At any moment, fish will leave the planet.
At any moment, wild thyme will cover the earth.
Mint will consume the village at any moment.
The earth can stop spinning at any moment.
I will fall asleep any moment now.
9.
Rabbitfish and Parrotfish nibble on a purple coral.
Later, they dart through another coral,
Half purple and half white on the ocean floor.
10.
I love the way stone people
look ahead, heads warmed
by the old sun. Their feet
buried deep in the earth.
I’d be scared to walk past them
after dark. Are they looking
for their gods? Have their gods
abandoned the island?
11.
Pyramids are tombs,
yet solar panels reflect the sun.
Everything shines like Abraham.
12.
T Rex has small hands
though the ocean is deep.
I am a fugitive from the Talmud.
13.
I will say yes to the grape, yes.
Yes, I will shout against thirst, yes.
I will try to smash the glass
against the wall. Yes. Glass
fragments will spell out yes.
14.
We will stand up straight
and dust our loved ones’ photos.
My father in Forest Park. Green
landscape, a drained pond.
15.
I love eagles.
I see them fly over Slide
Mountain. I saw one
in a tree off Barkaboom Road.
Does anyone think they are secret
reservoir gods, cold like the water,
looking for prey? Eagles know
how to be beautiful.
Heavy heads, strong beaks,
perfect talons, gold eyes.
I love them.
Sharon Israel, a Sephardic-American poet, was an early recipient of Brooklyn College’s Leonard B. Hecht Poetry Explication Award, was nominated for “Best of the Net” and won Four Lines’ 2020 winter poetry challenge. Her chapbook Voice Lesson was published by Post Traumatic Press. Sharon’s work has most recently appeared in Loud Coffee Press. Sharon hosts the radio show and podcast, Planet Poet-Words in Space, on WIOX 91.3 FM in the Catskills (available on YouTube Music, Spotify and Apple). Sharon is a member of the sound/poetry duo OrphicMix with composer Robert Cucinotta. Visit Sharon’s website Sharonisraelpoet.com or https://linktr.ee/sharonisraelpoet.
Amethyst Review 