NVN Saturday: poems for two Saturdays
“Eclipse” by Matt Witt and “Saturday, October 7, 2023” by Katherine West
ECLIPSE, SATURDAY, OCTOBER 14, 2023
by Matt Witt
The sun will appear as a blazing ring of fire in the sky over the Americas on Saturday, Oct.14, as an annular eclipse sweeps over the continent. Photo: Digital composite view of annular solar eclipse on May 20, 2012. Seven separate exposures were made twenty minutes apart and combined into one image. (Image credit: Paul Souders via Getty Images) — Space.com
*
We hardly notice it at first, just a normal morning with people walking their dogs and checking for messages But then the light gets dimmer, just a little at a time, until it feels like night and we are stumbling around But this is not the end because if we stay alert the light comes back and we can see again
*
Matt Witt is a writer and photographer in Talent, Oregon. His work may be seen at MattWittPhotography.com.
*
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2023
by Katherine West
*
Even in October butterflies crowd the butterfly bush are lifted by the cold wind then released to drift back to their magenta breakfast in a flurry of giant orange flakes of Halloween snow or fire The high rise looks like a grey ice cream cake left out in the summer sun so that slabs of cement melt and slide down its sides to the street where grey children lie with their eyes shut the party over time to go home The prairie dog sits up on its hind legs still and alert waiting for danger— shadows of crows pass over him and away like the low-flying planes in black and white newsreels of World War Two Pale blue flowers still cling to the tips of the rosemary bush but the lavender and thyme are dried out helpless when the wind drives down the mountain strips them bare In this house the cabinets are full of supplies— ten of everything, power to run fountains in the desert thick walls to keep the heat out to keep the heat in-- a fat door like that of a castle Vultures come in a black rush sometimes-- the body bags are white as lumps of sugar with the corners licked off
*
Katherine West lives in Southwest New Mexico, near Silver City. She has written three collections of poetry: The Bone Train, Scimitar Dreams, and Riddle, as well as one novel, Lion Tamer. Her poetry has appeared in journals such as Writing in a Woman's Voice, Lalitamba, Bombay Gin, The New Verse News, Tanka Journal, Splash!, Eucalypt, Writers Resist, Feminine Collective, Southwest Word Fiesta, and The Silver City Anthology. The New Verse News nominated her poem “And Then the Sky” for a Pushcart Prize in 2019. In addition she has had poetry appear as part of art exhibitions at the Light Art Space gallery in Silver City, New Mexico, the Windsor Museum in Windsor, Colorado, and the Tombaugh Gallery in Las Cruces, New Mexico.