The Carpathians - University of British Columbia

S u e A n n J o h n s t o n
For Pioneering Women Whose
Babies Died
How could they bear the need to bear
what must be buried in a bare land
with bare acknowledgement
A cross of sticks.
No place like this, a poem to bury sadness in.
Horizons endlessly unscrolling—
unframed, unfurnished,
bones rocking inside the skin
milk dripping through invisible holes
mockery in this dry land
where hunger has no mouth
A n n a
M o z g a
Leontodon
He was a dandy lion
the colour of butter
long of tooth but jolly too
When his mane became
the colour of eggshell
and his smile without bite
He let the wind take him in tufts
—as it roared and whispered
and sang of dying