Vernal
by Alison Mandaville
You hope the oats are clean. You want
the bowl to be satisfied. And the milch goats
to strip out empty, cup white to the top.
You want knees to bend and re-bend
each morning, new days coming faster
with every spoonful: So spring comes.
With its ridiculous loveliness and boughs
of pink. See: your father sits weak on your left
side, left-handed, green vision Monet-ing the fiddle-
heads down in the sideyard. Your mother
relinquishes the servo-controls from your right
thumb and forefinger, your kicking foot, the eye
that works properly. She has her own tulip
bulbs to break and blow. And your heart, grown
big between them, steals the March. Twirls on.
Alison Mandaville
Alison Mandaville grew up in Portland, Oregon, Turkey, Massachusetts and Yemen. Her poetry and translations from Azerbaijani have appeared in Terrain, Superstition Review, Magma, Seattle Review, World Literature Today and Two Lines among other places. She has received cultural heritage grants from UNESCO and Open Society Institute for work with Azerbaijani women writers and artists. She splits her time between Seattle and Fresno where she teaches comics, writing and literary civics at California State University, Fresno.