Derek Webster


The Catamaran

Mauve and sapphire, ruby-orange, emerald-blue,
Dragonflies shimmer and hum in the pines.

Ineffable steel, webs cut the body,
The spider’s bite, straight to the eye—

Eye which swivels, then shivers, as the body curls.
Wrapped bodies twirl in the pines.

Cold swims, card games, nonsense verse.
The evenings and days turn usual.

The young woman goes back to bed after breakfast,
Her lover does the dishes to start eating again.

Pupae burst, scale the rock-faces,
Translucent Recluse leave holes in the wood

To hang from former selves,
Spinnakers and wings. Lull finds

The catamaran, its sails and fuselage.
Design’s emptiness in the pause.



Study of My Left Hand after Dishwashing

Lines trace lines.
A maze churns the thumb.
Magnified: burial runes, a starred sky—

Comparing hands, early man
Could lift his face, mesmerized.

A hand is still a hand.
Open, close, hold, caress.
Take mine.


The Sociologist’s Study

Reading the national best-seller
Why We Lock

Our Doors at Night; reading
The surveyed parties’ answer,

Black and white,

Life would be better
If Man found his country’s roots;

In place of rushing to, fro,
Tended tomatoes, his neighbors thoughts—

I faltered;

And withdrew to
Stare at the houses across,

And upwards wondered
Where were the stars.


Anne Street

I met a heart
Walking down Anne Street
And it gave me a pamphlet
That said “Give generously.”

Across the highway,
Baroque red, poised houses—
I was lost,
Anne Street found me.

Factories closing, long ago.
A hill gently lowering.
The trees humor-sized, leading
To the riverbank.

The sidewalks ache.
The hydrants wait.
Underneath, water moves
Through pipes with salmon gills.

The young couples move back
At night, undress as they unpack.
Trees fruit, the fruit falls unpicked,
Rains come, unstain the sidewalk.




The Cedarfield Retirement Community

Bridge, lemon tea, and talk of tours
in the war. Not musty, more sterile—
a hospital elevator. Muted trombones
play Thirties tunes. Empire chairs
and still lifes dot the halls
to the dining room. Chef
cuts lamb any night.

Two more certainties,
Nurses and a doctor, sleep on-site.
Try to focus on the eyes, a child’s first
devotion. Love and history our only ways out.
My grandfather’s grandfather is still
riding home, two weeks on a southbound
mule, from Pickett’s Charge—