David Allen Sullivan's first book, "Strong-Armed Angels," was published by Hummingbird Press, and two of its poems were read on air by Garrison Keillor. His second book, from which these poems are taken, is "Every Seed of the Pomegranate," and is forthcoming from Tebot Bach. He teaches at Cabrillo Community College in Santa Cruz, CA, where he edits the Porter Gulch Literary Review with his students.
Fall 2011
Table of Contents - Vol. VII, No. 3
Poetry Fiction Translations Reviews
David Allen Sullivan
Persephone. She took six
pomegranate seeds
in her mouth, bit down
to release bright blood capsules
that stained lips and tongue.
The one who kept her
laughed, for she would be his bride
half of every year.
How to say? Sorrow
cuts us in two with sweetness.
Half the world is dead
to the other half.
Above us mothers walk
under bare branches.
Nine months I’d waited.
The seed of the girl had grown.
The helicopter shook
the blue sky above
our street in Sadr City.
I saw others run.
Zahra, my sister,
tried to help but I was slow.
The machine puffed white
and I felt the heat
lay a heavy hand on me,
as if I was drowned
in head scarves. Looked down
to find my legs gone. Skin strips
hung loose. My sister
seemed to be at prayer.
But her red insides were out.
Nothing but blood moved.
*
In the ambulance
I begged them to save the girl
I was carrying.
They told me there was
nothing to be saved but me.
When my husband came
he stood in the door
nervously stroked his mustache.
He could not enter.
You were not this way
when I left you. You were whole.
Now you’re in pieces.
If you can’t return
the way you were, carrying
my daughter, don’t come.
*
They say I cannot
kill myself because Allah
has forbidden it.
But when I took all
the capsules I grew foggy
and everything swam.
It was like the day
I lay on that street. Nothing
and no one touched me.
I wish they had not
pumped my stomach. Blessings if
you bring me a gun.
© David Allen Sullivan
