Poetry by Emily Wolahan

              ​Christian Collins CC




Tansy
Tanacetum vulgare
ASTER FAMILY
4’. Many tiny, button-like yellow flowers                         You 
in dense clusters; rays minute, barely visible                     did
around large disk. Leaves dark green, fern-like,                       not
tripinnately compound; aromatic when crushed.                      injure
CAUTION Poisonous. BLOOMS Aug.–Sept.                 me.
HABITAT Roadsides, ditches, pastures.

===

Thrumming on the street just beside where 
                                              I am trapped multiphasic, multifocal, 
                multi-bound to the slap of ash in air. 

                                               The fire cannot jump this road -
                                                             until the fire jumps this road. 

My answer is left off the static page. 
                                             Is spread, barely visible pulling energy 
                 to its heart. You placed the paper on the embers 

with an ease that did not cease until 
                 the show was over. Smoke rose. False snow 

blurs edges between solid and immaterial, 
                                 somewhere between injure 
                                 and nurture. You keep on leaving your mark. 

                                               Whorl me, disintegrate me, crumble me up. 
                                                                              Take me in your mouth. I taste rich.
​

​

Emily Wolahan is the author of the poetry collection Hinge (NPRP, 2015). Her poetry has appeared in Puerto del Sol, Sixth Finch, Georgia Review, and Oversound. She is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Anthropology and Social Change (CIIS) and is a Poetry Editor at Tinderbox Poetry Journal.

---