THREE PROSE POEMS | CLAUDIA SEREA The snake The Unbrother woke at night and made a clay snake. The snake told him to drown his brother. Brother woke up, caught the snake and threw it in the sky, to wind around the earth nine times and protect it from the flood. You can see it right there: the white snake stretched over the house with all its silver scales. Yeah, grandma, but what happened to the brothers? One of them lives in your heart. The other one coils in your belly. Bigeye Bigeye could see the grain of dust in the wind and the flame in coal. He could see the fish in the sea. He could see the child inside his mother’s womb, the tulip inside the bulb, the sap beneath the bark of trees, the grubs underground. He could see buried seeds and bones, the grass roots penetrating the graves. But people clouded Bigeye’s vision. He couldn’t see the lies behind a straight face. Greed was a smudge and love a blur. Bigeye was afraid, so he went to the doctor and got big eyeglasses. He always wore them. That’s how he spotted the purple spider hanging inside his own left ventricle. The worms The giant used a huge rake deep across the garden and gathered the worms and grubs in mounds that soon grew into heaps. The giant smashed the worms with his boots. He drowned some; others he buried in the lead mines. Hundreds of thousands of squirmy worms shoveled, gone. Without them, the land withers and mills into dust, for everyone knows the worms weave the earth and keep it together. Claudia Serea is a Romanian-born poet who immigrated to the U.S. in 1995. She is the author of two poetry collections: Eternity’s Orthography and To Part Is to Die a Little, forthcoming from Cervená Barva Press. She lives in New Jersey and works in New York for a major publishing firm.http://astore.amazon.com/contrary-20/detail/1599241684shapeimage_1_link_0
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AUTUMN 2010 COVER THREE PROSE POEMS CLAUDIA SEREA THREE PROSE POEMS KRISTINE ONG MUSLIM THE THING ABOUT DEPARTURES TASHA COTTER DAYDREAMING IN MY LOVER’S ARMS AFTERWARD DAMON McLAUGHLIN THE POOL DAVID MOHAN FINGERS MICHELLE MILLER INSECT EFFECT ANNIE BELLET RECENT AWARD WINNERS REBECCA LEHMANN SHERMAN ALEXIE MEREDITH MARTINEZ REVIEWS BENJAMIN PERCY TOVE JANSSON C.K. WILLIAMS KARA CANDITO BOB COWSER JR. KATIE DONOVAN SUSANNA DANIEL Autumn_2010.htmlKristine_Ong_Muslim_Prose_Poems.htmlKristine_Ong_Muslim_Prose_Poems.htmlTasha_Cotter_Departures.htmlTasha_Cotter_Departures.htmlDamon_McLaughlin_Daydreaming.htmlDamon_McLaughlin_Daydreaming.htmlDamon_McLaughlin_Daydreaming.htmlDavid_Mohan_The_Pool.htmlDavid_Mohan_The_Pool.htmlMichelle_Miller_fingers.htmlMichelle_Miller_fingers.htmlAnnie_Bellet_Insect_Effect.htmlAnnie_Bellet_Insect_Effect.htmlhttp://www.contrarymagazine.com/Contrary/Factory.htmlSherman_Alexie_Census.htmlhttp://www.contrarymagazine.com/Contrary/Love.htmlReviews.htmlBenjamin_Percy_The_Wilding.htmlTove_Jansson_Travelling_Light.htmlCK_Williams_On_Whitman.htmlKara_Candito_Taste_of_Cherry.htmlBob_Cowser_Jr_Green_Fields.htmlKatie_Donovan_Rootling.htmlSusanna_Daniel_Stiltsville.htmlshapeimage_5_link_0shapeimage_5_link_1shapeimage_5_link_2shapeimage_5_link_3shapeimage_5_link_4shapeimage_5_link_5shapeimage_5_link_6shapeimage_5_link_7shapeimage_5_link_8shapeimage_5_link_9shapeimage_5_link_10shapeimage_5_link_11shapeimage_5_link_12shapeimage_5_link_13shapeimage_5_link_14shapeimage_5_link_15shapeimage_5_link_16shapeimage_5_link_17shapeimage_5_link_18shapeimage_5_link_19shapeimage_5_link_20shapeimage_5_link_21shapeimage_5_link_22shapeimage_5_link_23shapeimage_5_link_24shapeimage_5_link_25shapeimage_5_link_26