Christien Gholson
Matter


She shows me the black body, 
the yellow thorax, middle 
covered in marigold fur. 
        The long tongue unravels 
past long thin purple petals, into
a netherworld of white pollen, 
where trees and fields, 
        houses and other creatures, 
continually emerge from
                                      and return to 
white dust. There is 
a furless circle on its back, 
chitin-smooth, 
                      and I fall in…That 
is the proboscis, these are my feet. 
Those are the forelegs, these 
                                      are my hands. 
That is the pollen basket, these are 
my eyes. 
                  There has been damp soil 
around us this whole time, 
                            petrichor scent, 
      invisible creatures on the wing, 
the dark matter that holds 
                                                us together.


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Christien Gholson is the author of several books of poetry, including The Next World (Shanti Arts), Absence; Presence (Shanti Arts) and All the Beautiful Dead (Bitter Oleander); along with a novel, A Fish Trapped Inside the Wind (Parthian Books). He is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize for poetry, with work appearing in Ecotone, Permafrost, Flyway, The Shore, Hotel Amerika, Clackamas Literary Review, and The Sun, among other journals. He lives in Oregon and works as a mental health counselor/somatic experiencing practitioner at a clinic collective. https://christiengholson.blogspot.com/"
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