from Mist Nets

by Stephanie Anderson

10

Parrots announcing

Dinosaur hooks on wing crooks

Life upon life Insect chords A fork-tailed wood nymph

You say A double-toothed kite?

Pink bulbs

You say Fishtail palm

Large leaves dropping A march of holes across a leaf

Scanning for monkeys

You say I don’t like the sounds here

You say We can use that leaf as sandpaper to smooth You say Can you tell ruddy?

You say Someone said that about passenger pigeons

You say Rail in the trail You say Over here, who is this?

A cooperative spider web

You say Up in the tangle? You say There’s something flycatching

A rusty see-saw

You say What’s green with a yellow belly? You say Why do we call ours oxbow?

A summer kitchen A coquette A long-tailed tyrant

Frolicking between the chiggers

Another kind of nightjar The call dropping from major to minor A high whistle

You say I do like talking to owls You say It is the hour of commotion

You say Because it happened after dinner

Lemon-throated Chestnut-eared Pale-legged

You say I remember the name, so I know I saw it

Plain-wing White-browed

You say That was the black-throated You say What about fruit?

Slender-footed Pink-throated Hooded Masked crimson Golden-belly

You say Female, in the morning

Rusted-back Yellow-rumped Olive

You say That’s actually all about the birds

11

You say One of my toes is still wet

Silver water against early

Rain, a rooster-call The sweet swept air

Thunder fall

You say Again, again, don’t go by the name

Honking the bends A new kind of monkey

The mountains greening at approach

You say Like dirt’s going to do any good and stay

A police checkpoint Marbles The grass dried gold

Filtered light Clay brick An alphabet chalked

A woman weaving Ruins down

Trees arrow-straight against the severe slope

Two poles holding hay against the hill

A pink house

You say We didn’t check in on the vultures

A city lined with hillside stars

12

Cobblestones

Pale-vented

Double-faced ring

Magpie

The weighted hand

You say An armada of whales

Russet-backed Lineated

You work a more elaborate list

Undulated Palm-throated Yellow-browned

One shade meeting another

Stephanie Anderson

Stephanie Anderson is the author of four chapbooks, including In the Particular Particular (winner of the 2006 DIAGRAM/New Michigan Press Chapbook Prize) and The Nightyard (winner of the 2009 Noemi Press Chapbook Prize). A full-length book, In the Key of Those Who Can No Longer Organize Their Environments, is forthcoming in Summer 2013 with Horse Less Press. She edits Projective Industries.

An excerpt from her poem "Mist Nets" was also published in Two Serious Ladies.