(A Sonnet in response to Debora Moore's Glass Orchidarium exhibition)

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Nymphs, your glass bodies do frame our own curves

mortality’s lost scents we are — breezes

in the nostril, prayers of lovers, hip swerves

in the cup of night, a kiss that eases

how could we love anything more than moss

more than rain on your belly, the promise

of waterfalls, mist, of soft dreams not loss,

to be fragrant as hope on the chalice

of orchid’s lips? Each of you an army

of love, each breast a song…

missing from our daily lives of steamy

cars, of concrete, of crows, of gulls, of long

unremembered rivers turned to channels

when earth had eyes, legs, a goddess’ shield, arms for battles
Jourdan Imani Keith, Seattle’s Civic Poet, is our Poet in Residence for October.

Previously: “Let Seattle Be”.