Poetry by Karen Paul Holmes

​Adrien Millet CC




Eight Months Beyond      

                 - For Chris (1956-2017)

The sky kills me, its sunset blood-red,                        
each minute smearing a deeper pigment above
                     the mountains’ black tips.

Solo on this dock, not a boat nor soul near--
a rare chance to wail, Are you there? 

Two mallards drift by, parting
the sky reflected on the lake.    They hush me,
                the drake’s teal head glinting. 

A lone female appears
       then moves into the place
where last light has bruised the water purple-black. 





Bridge
    

Arching the blue Hiwassee River,
this structure over a depression, this means of transition 
takes me to the top of the dam where I can almost touch 
birds. They glide at my height, the lake’s islands
and slow-motion boats below.

Or a ship’s bridge, with its helm and wide-angle view 
cruising St. Lucia’s coast. I wrote in my journal, 
horizon of volcano peaks, jagged outline
drawn by the low sun.

In music, two bridges:
A piece of wood supporting gut strings
to transmit vibrations from Stradivarius
into my body, nearly dropping me to knees. 
And also, the link between parts of a song 
like George Harrison shifting to “I don’t know how,” 
then back again to his guitar gently weeping.  

All those bridges, you were for me 
when you lived. And also verb: 
bridging me over the chasm of divorce from half-ness 
to wholeness, and then after death, lessening the gap
from loss to certainty that love doesn’t stop.

Only with your help have I arrived at this cove.  
My new husband and I stand hand-in hand
in the last quarter of our lives.
Silvergrass waves. Our harmonics hum.
We watch fishers move their boats from favored shoal
to favored shoal. 

for Chris, 1956-2017
                and for Mark, 1951-



​
Karen Paul Holmes is a freelance business writer but poetry is her passion. She hosts The Side Door Poets in Atlanta, GA and a monthly open mic in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Her poetry books are  No Such Thing as Distance (Terrapin, 2018) and Untying the Knot (Aldrich, 2014) and publications include Diode and Valparaiso Review. She’s the current “Poet Laura” for Tweetspeak Poetry. ​