Caprice Garvin
Caprice Garvin holds an M.F.A. from Sarah Lawrence College. Her work has most recently appeared in Colorado Review, North American Review, Poetry East, The New Verse News, Glass: A Journal of Poetry, Terrain.org, and Lily Poetry Review.
This Atlas
These are the boundaries of waves. See how these pulp-shoulders heave, this bound collection of mountains and fields, desert winds taking on mollusk hardnesses, anchoring lead, prehensile tail and translucent pine, shark and minnow and meadow-fly.
For there is worry of flooding; of prescribed depths floundering across sand; paper’s edge receding; encroaching ink thrashing like eels;designations crackling cliffs; latitude snagged by a branch— only a child’s hair-ribbon after all.
And then it comes, more ocean than road,more brine than tar-bubble popped beneath toe. Even the meadows might suddenly be swum through. Even the mountains share a kinship with fish. It is nautilus then, this sunset, this folding of red.It is the crackle of map finding its way back to mapmaker.See how this atlas dissolves in my hand.
For there is worry of flooding; of prescribed depths floundering across sand; paper’s edge receding; encroaching ink thrashing like eels;designations crackling cliffs; latitude snagged by a branch— only a child’s hair-ribbon after all.
And then it comes, more ocean than road,more brine than tar-bubble popped beneath toe. Even the meadows might suddenly be swum through. Even the mountains share a kinship with fish. It is nautilus then, this sunset, this folding of red.It is the crackle of map finding its way back to mapmaker.See how this atlas dissolves in my hand.
The Museum of Comfort
In this rotunda, we must enter softly, silently. Let us stand very still. We’ve recently secured ancient recordings, voices whispered straight into the ear, secrets not meant for parents to hear, a balm for the long, lonely wound between generations, some might say. This wall is devoted to the mass extinction of the kiss. And here we will pause, and I will mention our museums’s plan for the future: an exhibit focusing on friends, the science of their lying down, side pressed to side. We are working on funding. Similarly our research department is in need, as it hopes to further its studies into the various hypotheses of the hug… Ah! But here we have arrived at something truly surprising. Behind this curtain, a pavilion, and in that pavilion, from deep in the Amazon and caught with a net—a few last surviving solaces! No. Not fossils. Living. And until last month, unknown to the world. They must remain a secret, for their own protection. Though, for you, our generous donors, I will move aside this velvet rope, pull back the curtain. No need to show your VIP badge on the way in. You will see, as you enter, a guard, and a second curtain. Just continue through. Walk gently, be wary of vermillion. Dart of emerald eyes. If you are fortunate, you might feel empathy’s antennae brush your sleeve, but please keep bare hands in pockets. For such fragile consolations, the oils of touch are deadly.
