Richard Spilman, Hurricane, West Virginia, USA
Rosy Maple Moth
On the façade
by the garage door,
a fleck of color—
yellow head, pinkish
wings sheltering
in plain sight.
All day I’ve dug
the rocky clay
of our hillside,
planting arbor vitae
where the pines
fade to brush.
It’s a shock after
hardscrabble,
this little splash
of brilliance, this
luxury flowering
on pale brick.
Exuberance has,
even here, a place,
a moment to
offer, no matter
the risk, its brief
shock of joy.
Spring in the Northern Rain Forest
We walk delicately on the year’s
new graves, witness to the havoc
of spring in a frigid jungle where
every breath is a ghost in the dark:
Birdsong and insect ululation.
the river protesting its new
boundaries, leaves like morning
rain soughing hymns of praise.
A bracket fungus, fallen overnight,
lies covered in frothy mold.
Even where the path remains, it
sucks at our shoes, as we pick
our way, always on the verge
of slipping into snow-melt runs.
In the dusk of old growth
we pause, look past the tall
tortured trunks of red cedar
into canopies weighted with moss
and lichens, growth upon growth.
Even the air seems burdened.
Then light breaks through.
A hundred-year Sitka spruce,
downed in the January storm,
has cut a wide swath in its fall.
Nearby, an older catastrophe
crumbles decorously, carved
by larvae, six young daughters
rising from its disintegration.
Trees grow smaller, ferns rust
and the river flares, seeking
the shingled sea. Where the old
banks were, alders swoon,
awaiting the death knell
of another storm. We pick
through the detritus of spring’s
cruel housekeeping: tumuli
of muck bordered by brush
heaps, islets stripped of all
but the gravel beneath,
rocks ripped from their rest.
Every year, the river destroys
what it once obeyed, flattens
every bank and bar in a rage
to smooth and straighten.
Oceanward, an orange sun burns
on the curve of dark waves
that thunder ashore like storm
echoes, inking the sand black.
We come to make what we can
of loss, rediscovering old paths
and flagging new, pitching
the tent in unfamiliar places,
and on the way, gather tokens
of our trek: driftwood and garnet,
photos and daybook entries
bleeding on dampened pages.
Richard Spilman is the author of In the Night Speaking and a chapbook, Suspension. His work has appeared in many journals including Poetry, The Southern Review, Canary, Clade Song, Pilgrimage, and Western Humanities Review.