Three Poems

by Annie Stenzel

Found: in ABQ – studio art jewelry by Jessica deGruyter

The messengers speak, in passing

fragrance of another time
creates mischief in my mind

this can happen in August—even here
with our salt-wind Mediterranean air—

a sharp gust plucks a fistful
of leaves and rattles them down

the pavement to scatter summer
out of the path, introduce the sharp

scent of a different season/
latitude/geography

when I was someone else and could not
possibly imagine my current self

how is this done? this rough magic
whereby vagrant molecules (aroma)

assemble on the signal from some
displaced component

and the mixture, once admitted through
a single sense, overwhelms the others

to re-constitute a place, an instance
in my story, whisper-dim

until this moment merciful brevity
of such time-travel

I nearly wrote "travail" because
the gods know just how hard it is

being absolutely present for one minute
even once or twice, in memory

A breach in the barrier against nostalgia

My Belgian brother writes of running
in the Forêt de Soignes
and I'm transported wide-eyed
back through time: to follow me

just use that wondrous cinema technique
that strips or melts or slides the years away
so in a trice you see
the same person, but much, much younger.

spectrum

in the before-light of the winter
solstice, all things are held
in one breath: the sky spilling
its darkness into the adjacent
latitude; colors almost too pale to name
seep back first.

morning breaks earlier here
and later there, in the antipodes.
my faraway sister's weather, strange
in its annual unfamiliarity.
summer nights breathless for me
while, clad in wool, she stokes the fire.