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Find me

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Can I see it? Gravity like glue

or something more substantial like

the sigh of a sick child. Find me like

an open tulip, smooth, tangible liquid. Find me

like science is found enhancing the faint glow of

an almost-faith. I am reeling with need, chosen to bend

into this desperation as hips bend forward,

seeking the electric dimension of togetherness. I must be

an oversized squid under deep layers of ice, unaware

of such things as galaxies and weather –

breathing in my cold hell,

shipwrecked in this cavern of isolation. I must be unable

to love – impatience burrowing into me, past

muscles, touching the skin beneath skin. Yielding, I am

yielding to its mouth, subterranean pressure,

feeling the anxiety of knowledge

that disinfects each particle until

it is made nude, until it is like a knife-tip to the cornea

or a standing ovation given to all that swells to capacity,

pushes even further, then explodes.

 

Morning is beautiful. I am planting.

Will you find me, honour the primrose

on my veranda, maybe even snip one,

take it to your table and dream of a voice

other than your own?

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Copyright © 2012 by Allison Grayhurst

amazon.com/author/allisongrayhurst

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First published in “The Foliate Oak Literary Magazine”

http://www.foliateoak.uamont.edu/archives/march-2012/poetry/five-poems-by-allison-grayhurst/?searchterm=allison%20grayhurst

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You can listen to the poem by clicking below:

 

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“Allison Grayhurst intertwines a potent spirituality throughout her work so that each poem is not simply a statement or observation, but a revelation that demands the reader’s personal involvement. Grayhurst’s poetic genius is profound and evident. Her voice is uniquely authentic, undeniable in its dignified vulnerability as it is in its significance,” Kyp Harness, singer/songwriter, author.

“Allison Grayhurst’s poems are like cathedrals witnessing and articulating in unflinching graphic detail the gritty angst and grief of life, while taking it to rare clarity, calm and comfort. Grayhurst’s work is haunting, majestic and cleansing, often leaving one breathless in the wake of its intelligence, hope, faith and love amidst the muck of life. Many of Allison Grayhurst’s poems are simply masterpieces. Grayhurst’s poetry is a lighthouse of intelligent honour… indeed, intelligence rips through her work like white water,” Taylor Jane Green, Registered Spiritual Psychotherapist and author.

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Book reviews of the River is Blind paperback:

“Throughout (The River is Blind), she (Allison Grayhurst) employs 
reiterated tropes of swallowing and being consumed, spatial fullness 
and emptiness, shut- in, caverns, chasms, cavities; angels, archangels, 
blasphemy, psalms; satiation or starved. With a conceit of unrequited sex as “my desire”, nocturnal emissions, awakening in the morning, the poet lives at capacity, uninhibited, dancing,” Anne Burke, poet, regional representative for Alberta on the League of Canadian Poets’ Council, and chair of the Feminist Caucus.

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“Allison’s poetic prose is insightful, enwrapping, illuminating and brutally truthful. It probes the nature of the human spirit, relationships, spirituality and God. It is sung as the clearest song is sung within a cathedral by choir. It is whispered as faintly as a heartbroken goodbye. It is alive with the life of a thousand birds in flight within the first glint of morning sun. It is as solemn as the sad-sung ballad of a noble death. Read at your peril. You will never look at this world in quite the same way again. Your eye will instinctively search the sky for eagles and scan the dark earth for the slightest movement of smallest ant, your heart will reach for tall mountains, bathe in the most intimate of passions and in the grain and grit of our earth. Such is Allison Grayhurst. Such is her poetry. THE RIVER IS BLIND is a must-read,”  Eric M. Vogt, poet and author.

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