Michael Simms

Bio: Michael Simms is an American poet and literary publisher. His most recent book is American Ash. His poems have been published in literary journals and magazines including 5 A.M., Poetry Magazine, Black Warrior Review, Mid-American Review, Pittsburgh Quarterly, Southwest Review, and West Branch. He is the founder and editor of Vox Populi.

What Holds Us Together Keeps Us Apart

Dragon’s Blood

I dream of a forest in heaven
thick stands of American Ash
American Chestnut American Elm
Saint Helena Olive and of course
The Great Sequoia

And on a nearby island
Dragon’s Blood Trees
oozing red resin
cinnabar
which tinted the violins
of Stradivarius
The Fabric

The loss of each species
diminishes us
tears at the fabric and
the news is too much
with us

The bees in their
hives are dying the manatee
sliced by a motor blade
bleeding in the shallow
cove where her kind
have lived since we
were human the forests
of Amazonia are burning

We are burning
We are dying
Shoes

There is something
in the American heart
that wants to destroy
everything beautiful

The dirty child at our border
who walked 500 miles
sharing a pair of shoes
with her brother

And we
have no pity we have no shame
we refuse love and how
could we how could we want
something different than
love?

Darlin'

I like it when women I don’t know
Call me Darlin’. There’s something
Kind and generous in the tone

Without being sexual. The intimacy
Of strangers is luminous, the way
We wish well for the man who lost

His car keys, the woman coming in
Out of the rain, the girl who missed
Her bus, the boy who stutters.

The waitress who offers more coffee
Calls all the men at my table darlin’.
She may be somebody’s wife,

Somebody’s mother, somebody’s
Friend, but right now, to us
She’s the intimate stranger

Named Dolores, which means sadness,
Inviting us with a smile to have dessert.
You want me to alamode that

For you, Darlin’?

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