Sample A Few Poems from my upcoming Book IN THE LANGUAGE OF STONE to be released in October,2019 by Uttered Chaos Press

All poems copyright 1997-2019
by Joan Dobbie


STONES DO NOT MOVE

they don't move.
They just sit there
forever in rows.

Under them boxes.
Boxes of bones.
Dirty old bones.

Sprinkle my ashes over the ocean.
Sprinkle my ashes into the wind.
Teach me to fly. Let me fly.


IN CHILDHOOD

In childhood I carried a stone
in my stomach.
Later it rose to my heart
now it's stuck in my throat.

Sometimes I wake to it
hot between my legs. Sometimes
it's cold in my chest, or boring
a hole in the pit of my stomach.

Sometimes I take it in my hand,
hold it to my cheek, pop it
like a lozenge into my mouth,
rolling and rolling

it over my tongue. Once in the
demon-filled night
I threw it up over my head
high and hard. I was young then.

I could throw over-hand.
It soared
like a fast ball, clearing
the trees of my childhood, rose

till it struck solid sky, where
it stuck-- till I swallowed it.


GOD MADE THE WORLD

out of stone.
Goddess shrieked:

How could you do this
to me?

I made it first.
I made it of water.

THERE WAS AN OLD WOMAN

who walked in the desert.
Everything there
in the dry sand was dead.

Even the flowers that
once had held water
now were just crusts

where once water had been.
And walking one day

through that graveyard
of flowers
stubbing her toe

she discovered a stone--
such an odd, heavy stone.


THAT KIND OF STONE

that fits like a plum, like a
breast in your hand, fits
like a skull in your hand, like

sexual organs when they are swollen
with blood.

That kind of stone.
Whenever I touch it
I hate it.

Whenever I'm not touching it
my hands tingle and ache
for the feel of it.

If I could I would
throw it away. If I did
I would spend the rest of my life

sifting sand through
my fingers, creeping through
dirt

on my belly, molding
mud into shape with my fingers.

Joan Dobbie
Copyright 1997