Clea Allington
Clea Allington's poems have appeared in Pontoon #7, DMQ Review, Muse Apprentice Guild and King County Poetry on Buses 2004.
It's the 28th day of rain
Tian Tan Park , China
The Woman Watches the Moon
It's the 28th day of rain
And it has stopped, for the moment,
a rare sprig of sunlight peering
from battered black-grey clouds,
inviting a peek at the clearness behind.
It's the 28th day and we don't know
what to do with this sudden lack,
this ceaseless water we'd complained about
as we put a pump into the basement
and watched it bleed out gallons upon gallons.
Was our house dying? Or were we transfusing
air for blood, turning wet (like tears) into dry?
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Tian Tan Park , China
In the Temple of Heaven
petite brass cows lined in boxes,
their sleep pre-arranged.
Bright red pillars filigreed
with golden flowers, the floor
glossy black stone.
Straight
ahead and rising three or
four steps, is the throne.
As the round room quenches
all light, makes a permanent
dusk, we believe that a god
could descend into this ringed
temple
and speak to us, as once
he might have spoken to
the emperor. He has much to say
but our time is short. We move
on to the next ancient place,
the guide books telling us how
the emperor predicted crops,
weather, the health of livestock.
Recalling the trip, later,
we might remember how the air
ached with cold, the kites rose
like birds, our own sweet fatigue.
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The Woman Watches the Moon
Tonight stars appear in frost-white.
Consumed by jealously, the moon
swallows the sun. It glows impossibly,
as if it had gone nova and the woman
in the moon had abandoned her post.
She has been lost among its craters
watching us, pinned between the icy
cunning of the stars. And what should
she say to her consort, having left him?
Nothing? he knows how she yearns
for the rocky shores below the sky, how
when she is released she flickers and flares
all through the night, her own sweet light
among the earthly savages.
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