qarrtsiluni

(with a chorus for jays and bees)

by Rosemary Starace

The rosemary spills from the clench of the pot
the flux and the sex
of a gravelly musk.

Necessity sniffs at those ravels of leaves
and leaves her with flowers,
cerulean, mute.

In the spice and the peace of the sprawl of the morning,
her joy ruffles up,
the bee from its bloom.

HKYE! HKYE! HKYE!
Huhzzuzzah, huzzah.

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Rosemary Starace (website) lives in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, a small city in the middle of a big, hilly forest. She’s the author of Requitements and co-editor of Letters to the World: Poems from the Wom-po Listserv, with Moira Richards and Lesley Wheeler. Her work has appeared in Orion, Blueline, Studio, and elsewhere, including other issues of qarrtsiluni.