|
©
2013 Carla Braidek
This poem was previously published in the anthology Skating in the Exit Light, published in 2013 by the writer's group Sans Nom.
Carla Braidek lives in the boreal forest near Big River, Saskatchewan. In 2005, her book Carrying the Sun was short-listed in the Sask. Book Awards. The quirks and foibles of family and society along with the ever-changing
earth provide Carla with plenty of material for writing. Her poems have been published in several literary magazines, and have been included in a documentary and a poetic play. |
Swans for Jane
I dig through the heart of winter toward midsummer heat
carry memories like coals in a moss pouch
in the year’s pause I dangle questions
bare feet over a pond teeming with fish
dream of limbs stretched against sand
the grit on my skin rasping me smooth
the angle of my hip a twin line to white
bones in the summer pasture
what I carry forward is more than desire
fossilized smells between layered days
rise unexpectedly as the dead
their ghosts wafting in the dip of swans
as they settle on the bay
