Poetry by Milla van der Have

     Jochen Spieker CC




Milk of dreams

i walked without walking
snowbound, with the deer
up to the heights 
where all that matters
is the inevitable turn of sky 

when it becomes as sharp
as a disembodied dream

they are everywhere, the deer
even in the soul of winter
as nothing dies and everything does
even in the city that lags behind 
me, distant as a wayward child

and as wilful, daring
to let go of what has somehow
salvaged me

like the trees that must now become
significant, reaching up
to where the constellations 
are carved out
of broken antlers

by way of pilferage

here, nothing speaks and yet
they are, tough as an entrance
and as unforgiving
as the milk
they curdle into being

                (a masterful stroke, of practiced hands)

into strings, like stars, of all our jawbone
magnitude

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Milla van der Have is a Gemini. She is the author of 3 chapbooks. Her latest collection Ox and Mandarin | Wayfaring Strangers is published in English by Dancing Girl Press and in Spanish by Ril Editores. Milla lives in Utrecht, The Netherlands. She is the host of Poetry Lit!