Poems of Cheryl Gatling

No Frogs in Eastwood

2008-01-01T05:22:00.000-08:00

My child presses her face to the glass at the zoo.
“There’s one,” I say,
pointing to the golden mantella,
to the rain forest blues and reds.
She sees. She answers, “Frog.”
Science News says, “Frog Populations Decline.”
My daughter feels no loss.
Frogs are as plentiful as ever
on the pages of picture books,
where they squat beside giraffes,
unicorns, dragons, and dinosaurs,
each as real to her as the other.
Really real would be a barefoot child
splashing in a farm pond, squealing in pursuit
of a creature too fast, too slippery to hold.
Real would be falling asleep
to the plunking, rubber-band chorus.
My job is to make it real
for a child with no backyard creek
on her forty-foot city lot.
“See it jump? See it jump?” I say.
See how the skin glistens?
See the strong, splayed legs?
The delicate, pulsing throat?
She sees. Sees the marvelous, comical form,
but not (not yet) the sign that reads, “Endangered.”
It is my job to make her fall in love
with what is passing. It is my job
to prepare her heart for breaking.

Cheryl Gatling

published in River Oak Review

Crossing Over

2007-01-01T05:15:00.000-08:00

As my eyes grew accustomed to the light, details of the room within emerged, strange animals, statues, and gold—everywhere the glint of gold. It was all I could do to get out the words, “Yes, wonderful things.”

--Howard Carter, on discovering King Tut’s tomb

The preschool door opened, and I could not stop looking.

Everywhere, wonderful things…

cardboard blocks colored like bricks,

wagons, balls, wooden stove and sink,

everything bright, everything just my size.

Then Miss Porter bent to talk to me.

Her hair slid forward over her shoulders,

shining like a river of pennies.

I couldn’t talk. My throat was swollen with wonder.

But Miss Porter’s green eyes smiled.

She led me to the toy kitchen, and put a doll in my arms.

My baby had a brown face, and brown yarn hair

that stuck straight out like the rays of the sun.

Mommy stooped to kiss me, but kissed only my hair.

I had already turned away.

I had to feed my radiant brown sun baby.

I held the bottle to her pouting plastic mouth,

and Mommy was gone. The floor lurched briefly then,

as I launched into my preschool life.

It would be a new world, but I was not afraid,

provisioned as I was with stackable rubber sandwiches,

plastic apples and bananas, dress-up hats,

a cot and a blanky, everything I would need,

everything I could imagine needing.

Cheryl Gatling

published in Atlanta Review

Leah

2007-01-01T05:07:00.000-08:00

Jacob served seven years for Rachel, and they seemed to him but a few days because of the love he had for her. Then Jacob said to Laban, “Give me my wife.” But Laban brought his daughter Leah, and gave her to Jacob.

He removed my wedding veil without candle or lamp.
He could not stop sighing, Rachel, Rachel,
except to kiss, and not even then,
breathing my sister’s name into my mouth.
The first time fast and hungry, then he woke
to caress everything, to trace
the bumps of my spine, the hollows of my knees.
I tried to remember not to speak, but the “ahs”
escaped. Finally, exhausted,
he held me wrapped by both his arms and legs.
And I waited in the dark, knowing
that no matter how many years we would spend
living as husband and wife,
I would never be loved that way again.
And I watched the tent wall slowly go
from black to grey, my heartbeat
counting the minutes, until he would see my face
and scream.

Cheryl Gatling

published in Willow Review

The Things He Gave Her

2007-01-01T05:03:00.000-08:00

First his letters, burned in the driveway.
The ripped photos she threw in the kitchen garbage,
followed by wilted salad, blobs of cheese.
The books, with their inscriptions (“love always”)
went to Secondhand Words, clothes to Good Will,
even the gold silk blouse, even the teddy.
Items fell from her like so much ballast.
Her hair was brushing the lintels of doorways.
Only the weight of her shoes held her feet to the floor.
She dug the rosebush (innocent live thing),
dumped the tangle of root and thorn at the curb.
Even (who would have thought) the salad tongs.
As the gold chain slipped from her neck,
the last strand of tether snapped.
It flew, 22 karat airborne brilliance.
It plopped into the lake in sinuous ripples.
And she floated into the crowns of trees,
surrounded by wobbling green leaves.
Startled birds exploded off the wire,
a shimmer of feathers around her head.

Cheryl Gatling

published in Gingko Tree Review

Nursing the Lost

2007-01-01T05:01:00.000-08:00

At fourteen months, she doesn’t need the milk.
So why continue? It’s no longer about
nutrition, immunity, bonding,
or comfort at bedtime. It’s just this:
once the milk is gone, it’s gone.
There will never be another child to feed.
The doctor saw to that.
For every beautiful thing that is gone forever,
for every kiss that will never be kissed,
for passenger pigeons, Tasmanian tigers,
for paintings and poems burned in the purge,
for hope winked out in any kind of prison,
for every soldier dead in every war,
Come, I lift my shirt.

Cheryl Gatling

published in Gingko Tree Review

Swedish Christmas Bread

2007-01-01T04:58:00.000-08:00

Because he was a neighbor, Mother said.
The wind flapped her skirt around her knees.
She tottered slightly on the icy snow.
Still, she kept her grip on the foil-wrapped package.

He was unshaven, dogs around his legs.
He took the package, heavier than it looked.
Sweet dough, dense with raisins and walnuts.

In the morning, they blamed the kerosene heater,
tipped by a careless foot, or a dog’s tail.
As the school bus chugged past the rubble,
every face turned to watch the smoke.

But I, only I knew that the man whose ashes
still smoldered beneath the blackened beams
had died with the taste of honey on his tongue.

Cheryl Gatling

published in Gingko Tree Review

The Patron Saint of Writers

2007-01-01T04:43:00.000-08:00

He is old, scrawny, his back hunched
from study, his fingers gnarled.
What harm can this man do,
busy at his pen-scratching?
But see? The old man’s ink-stained hands
stroke the muscular back of a full-grown lion.
The paws, big as plates, and heavy,
flex their claws. The jaws rumble.
Wherever the old man shuffles, the lion follows.
They are inseparable, best of friends,
the dry, cerebral scribe, and the hunter
who will crack your biggest bones with a snap,
whose favorite flavor is blood, who loves
the raw chewy muscle. The writer bends now
over a text extolling the mercy of God.
The lion rubs against his leg and yawns,
showing, then sheathing, the always-ready teeth.

Cheryl Gatling

published in Atlanta Review

Then We Became Swans

2007-01-01T04:30:00.000-08:00

You and I, wild, flying home,
our two long-necked shadows
rippling over the valley floor.
It is good, mounting the cool air,
your wing beside my wing,
but I am tired, and home is far.
Where is the shine of silver water?
Where are the rushes to shelter our sleeping,
shoulder to shoulder, and neck to neck?
Your sleek head, your feathered back
are my home. Below us,
the man raises the gun and aims.

Cheryl Gatling

published in The Cliffs "soundings"

Love Song with Cruise Control

2006-01-01T16:35:00.000-08:00

One by one, their heads nod, then drop
into a chorus of muffled snores.
Only I remain awake, holding the wheel.
I pilot these tons of steel at lethal speed,
twisting past drop-offs, abutments, massive trucks.
Husband, child, baby, how thoughtlessly
each of you drops your life
into these tired and slightly achy hands.
It would only take a flick of the wrist,
a moment's inattention. And yet you sleep.
And still I drive. The thought of your fragile,
precious bodies fills every mile,
a surfeit of joy and terror.

Cheryl Gatling

published in Gingko Tree Review

Infant Pneumonia

2006-01-01T05:23:00.000-08:00

She wouldn’t suck. She wouldn’t cuddle.
Her eyes rolled toward me, then away again.
I hugged her to my chest and ran
from the doctor’s office to the X-ray lab.
There they jammed her into a plastic tube
with her arms above her head,
still in her white T-shirt, crying.
“That’s good,” the technician said.
“It expands the lungs.”
When they handed her back,
I wouldn’t lay her down again.
I slept that night in a chair,
holding her up so the mucus would drain.
In sudden, sharp focus, I cherished it all:
the sweaty spikes of her damp hair,
the rattling vibrations of every breath.
I hold no moments more precious than these,
the nearly unbearable,
a pain so pure, it was almost like happiness.

Cheryl Gatling

published in The Sun

Every Day With Baby

2006-01-01T05:06:00.000-08:00

As I walked across the bridge she cooed and bounced,
then lurched backward out of my arms,
over the railing. I grabbed. I missed.
Her heavy head cracked on the sidewalk below.

I stumbled on the gravel towpath,
and she rolled into the canal.
The water was so brown I couldn’t find her.
I splashed and groped, touching only fuzzy rocks.

The Doberman at the corner snapped his leash.
He charged too fast. He dragged her off,
gnawed her limbs until the crying stopped.
Yet we made it home, hit by only one truck.

I fed her dinner on which she choked.
I gave her a bath in which she drowned.
I laid her in her bed where she rolled over and suffocated.
Tomorrow when she wakes we will do it again.

Cheryl Gatling

published in Willow Review

Knees

2006-01-01T04:55:00.000-08:00

It was church rule. All women and girls
must wear a dress that covered their knees.
In the hidey-hole under the hedge behind my house
I hiked my skirt, and hugged my knees.
Each bony knob fit in the cup of one palm,
and my chin fit between them. Wind played
with the baby-fine hairs. Pine needles tickled.
How funny the skin sliding over the kneecaps.
How soft the damp hollows behind,
where my fingers felt my heart beating.
When Mother called, I crawled out. I stood,
and the cotton fell in a ripple down my legs.
Now we would go to church and hear about Jesus.
He died on the cross, but first they stripped him.
He went naked to save us. All Jerusalem,
and all heaven saw his knees,
saw the boat of his hips, the wings of his shoulders,
his ribs, and long bones, and things I dare not name.
I wondered, I did not ask,
how could shame live in any body part,
after God had burned inside it like a sun?

Cheryl Gatling

published in Comstock Review

Honeymoon by Train

2005-09-01T16:37:00.000-07:00

She sat on the suitcases.
He went again to the counter
to ask when it was coming. "Late"
was all they would say. It was almost two.
Married fourteen hours,
nothing left to say. They sat,
missing their connection in Chicago,
missing the ferry in Michigan,
losing their hotel reservations.
But now the platform was humming.
And now he was lifting her up
onto the narrow shelf bed
where they began the creak
squeal, lurch, and clang into their future.
Out the window it was passing,
slowly, then faster: backs of warehouses,
backs of factories, junkyards,
wrapped in trash and shadow.
Then, "Look," he said, "it's Instant Whip."
A spotlighted billboard: white, red, clean.
"Instant Whip," she repeated,
in her fog of love and fatigue.
She would remember this sign, this night,
as years blurred like trackside trees,
his socks still on the floor,
the gas tank left empty,
her lip numb from biting back words;
she would remember her head on his chest,
his arms around her, rocking, rocking,
how like whipped cream
the expectations heaped on the plate
collapsed in the mouth like so much air,
but leaving the taste, sweet,
yes, sweet.

Cheryl Gatling

published in The Sun

Poem About Faith

2005-01-01T17:00:00.000-08:00

I’m kneeling in the shower,
naked, wet,
peering down the black hole of the drain.
I can see my gold earring there.
I can just grip it with the tweezers,
but I keep dropping it.
Careful, steady, squeezing tight,
almost up, and the earring falls.
I’ve been at this a long time.
I’m going to be late for work.
But I believe I can do this.
I believe two people can stay married for a lifetime,
that we can rescue troubled kids,
that this war will end.
I believe in forgiveness.
I believe God loves us.
And again, the earring falls.

Cheryl Gatling

published in The Comstock Review

The Mark

2005-01-01T05:10:00.000-08:00

On every stoop a paper.
At 149 Shotwell Park, a balloon,
a box of chocolates, a sheaf of roses.
It’s six AM. Another hour, and doors will open.
Men and women in various shades of gray
will shuffle out, yawning, to pick up
their Post-Standards and Wall Street Journals.
At 149 Shotwell Park, one woman,
(or maybe a man) will touch the roses
and burst into peach and pink and gold,
her robe glowing emerald, jade
and electric chicory blue.
Someone here is loved. And you,
for whom I wrote this poem,
you also bear the mark. Go to the mirror
and touch your shining face.

Cheryl Gatling

published in Comstock Review

Letter to John, No Longer Mine

2004-01-01T12:41:00.000-08:00

John, there is news, and not news.
That I am still digging, diligently,
to remove what I never planted, is not news.
That you are with me in the garden,
that the firm white flesh of the taproot
is you, and the tickling fronds of yarrow
are you, this is not news.
But the work is hard. And today,
as I chopped, hacked, slashed, and wrestled
with mullein as big as a shrub, and roots
in mats and roots in balls, and tangled nets
of runners that have no end,
I leaned back on my heels to catch
the cool breath of air on my prickly skin,
and Buddha was there. (Now this is news.)
And he said, "Free yourself of desire
and be free of suffering."
I said, "What do you think I'm doing here?"
And St. Paul, too, was there, exhorting me,
"Do not gratify the flesh. Set your mind on the spirit."
"Right," I said. "Right."
Then Seneca, too, that Stoic:
"Be satisfied with your present condition."
But do you think even one of these men
would pick up a shovel? They sat in the shade
arguing their theories and lies,
as I, with my hands in the earth,
could already feel the tickle of underground roots
wiggling their slow, persistent way back up,
seeking, again and again, John,
the light that is your face.

Cheryl Gatling

published in Flyway

Schrodinger's Newspaper

2004-01-01T04:51:00.000-08:00

I push open the creaky screen door,
and stoop down to pick it up,
because I must know.
It comes rolled up with the headlines inside,
a fortune cookie stuffed with misfortunes.
Crack it open, and suffering will spill out.

I hesitate. Until I smooth the paper flat,
tyrant and victim hover, suspended.
Until I read, the bullet hasn’t left the gun,
the hammer hasn’t hit the skull,
the suicide bomber hasn’t pushed the button.
The nails and gunpowder will stay
packed tight in their satchel under the shirt.
The girl in the market will stand forever
with her hand on the melon, smiling.

The odds are clear. Death will take his share
and not be cheated. I open and read. I ache,
knowing what I can’t stop, what already is.
And yet, every morning
my front steps are still here. My screen door,
the wet grass, the neighbor’s cat, still here.
The rolled baton of newsprint on the step
is cool proof that the presses ran all night
in that big building downtown, also still here.

Cheryl Gatling

published at bornmagazine.org

The Arithmetic of Grief

2004-01-01T04:17:00.000-08:00

--"My imagination... doesn't cope well with big numbers" -- Wislawa Szymborska

They told me a hundred thousand died
in the blinding flash, in the poisoned air.
I began to calculate a hundred thousand:
two thirds the city of Syracuse,
two packed Carrier Domes.
Still, what is a hundred thousand?

It is me. I was there.
Skin hung from me in sheets,
and not a cloth to stanch the bleeding,
as all my clothes had burned away.
The rest of my family never came home.

We grieve in particular, not en masse.
It's not two million Cambodians,
but the rows of skulls,
the cracked femur unearthed by the plow.

My crime was knowing how to read.
They smashed my glasses
before they kicked and pushed me to the field.
I worked so tired, so hungry, I wished I could die.
When the club hit my head I wanted to live.

It's not five hundred thousand cancer deaths,
but Debbie in her hospital gown,
the bird-like frailty of her bones.

I noticed the mole. I didn't ask the doctor.
My little boy will never recognize
the robust woman beside Daddy in the photographs.
His mother was too weak to pick him up.

Maybe it's true
our imagination is moved by singularity.
Still the human heart can hold
the sufferings of thousands, even millions,
one life plus one life,
one plus one plus one.

Cheryl Gatling

published in Wisconsin Review

Even the Nails in the Sheetrock Missed Her

2004-01-01T04:16:00.000-08:00

When she entered a room, the room paid attention.
When she entered his house,
the leather couches plumped up and shone,
the hardwood floors were giddy with tapping
against the soles of her small black shoes,
the books on the shelves jostled each other
for a better view of the waves of her hair.

When she didn't come, the walls held their breath,
straining to hear her voice, her laugh.
When she still didn't come, that crying noise wasn't him.
The white gauze curtains hung keening,
as they remembered the stroke of her fingers.
And at night, when he turned and turned,
it was only because the bed prodded him continually,
as the pillows pleaded in his ear, "Bring her back."
And when he sat up, his hand on his chest,
how could he breathe,
when all the air had gone out into the street
calling her name?

Cheryl Gatling

published in Rattle

Letter to John, No Longer Mine

2004-01-01T04:06:00.000-08:00

John, there is news, and not news.
That I am still digging, diligently,
to remove what I never planted, is not news.
That you are with me in the garden,
that the firm white flesh of the tap root
is you, and the tickling fronds of yarrow
are you, this is not news.
But the work is hard. And today,
as I chopped, hacked, slashed, and wrestled
with mullein big as a shrub, and roots
in mats and roots in balls, and tangled nets
of runners that have no end,
I leaned back on my heels to catch
the cool breath of air on my prickly skin,
and Buddha was there. (Now this is news.)
And he said, “Free yourself of desire
and be free of suffering.”
I said, “What do you think I’m doing here?”
And St. Paul, too, was there, exhorting me,
“Do not gratify the flesh. Set your mind on the spirit.”
“Right,” I said. “Right.”
Then Seneca, too, that Stoic:
“Be satisfied with your present condition.”
But do you think even one of these men
would pick up a shovel? They sat in the shade
arguing their theories and lies,
as I, with my hands in the earth,
could already feel the tickle of underground roots
wiggling their slow, persistent way back up,
seeking, again and again, John,
the light that is your face.

published in Flyway

Between Fear and Sex

2003-01-01T04:21:00.000-08:00

The doctor said, "No intercourse."
He described how the spasms of orgasm
could squeeze a tenuously implanted fetus
right out of the uterus.
He clamped his two hands together,
made a squishy noise with his mouth.

We comply. But not touching at all
had felt like death between us.
My husband holds me, runs his hands
over my body, kisses me and kisses me,
and I cry. I dread that touch
that might cause too much pleasure.
But there, between fear and sex, is need.

Cheryl Gatling

published in Clark Street Review

testing typing

2000-06-19T05:42:00.000-07:00

So this is the first line
This is the second
This is the third