Gregg Mosson is the author of two books of poetry, Season of Flowers and Dust (Goose River, 2007) and Questions of Fire (Plain View, 2009). His poetry and literary criticism have appeared in The Baltimore Review, The Cincinnati Review, The Urbanite, Smartish Pace, and previously in the Loch Raven Review.
Fall 2012
Table of Contents - Vol. VIII, No. 3
Poetry Fiction Translations Reviews
Gregg Mosson
Combing though sweet refuse, I catty-corner a white mouse,
arch overhead and hiss, as dusk paints the alley red.
They call me Tulip at home, but out here I’m a tigress.
In the trash can, my prize writhes, patted by a sheathed paw.
I yowl in the guest bedroom when the Mistress comes home.
She rears from the corpse, which I lick with my eyes.
Behind walls like mine, such sleepy felines.
At dusk they twitch with echoes of the hunt.
A dumb tenderness swishes in sunlight,
just kisses glass.
Fins like orange kites flutter,
entice no double other.
Within a bowl-molded horizon,
sudden glimpses of a similar.
Afternoon spreads its grays.
The bowl is mazed with rays.
The family slams home. Fins fold.
A wave of noise explodes
to a sprinkle of food
below the shadow of a hovering god.
We glimpse each other in facing crevices, waiting
for younger fish to misjudge their way. We both blink
at a water-wavy, mirroring shape—and I blend
back against the home reef, having seen a squid
identical to me just once before: a bespotted
blue sponginess dancing in pink brine,
then disappearing behind sea lettuce fronds.
A school of mammoth tuna moons
across, more than a mile long—
and by the time the tuna are gone,
a strong current pushes through,
erasing the settled world.
Again we spot each other, peaking
out of coral, so I spray. It sprays.
Ink billows, and all’s eclipsed.
© Gregg Mosson
