Corey Mesler

Typewriter

I never said I love you to the
old typewriter on which I wrote
my first poems, trembly little
constructs of spit and ink,
and I never looked back on
those terrible wordless nights
I wrote alone, until now, pilgrim,
until now.

 

There’s something that shines

There’s something that shines
and I move toward it.
Night, alone in the whole
witchery, I long and,
longing, want to shorten sleep.
The years, the years I say
to the clock and the collie, I
thought they’d grow soft
for me. I thought I’d be more
peaceful. Patience, I name the
bedclothes. And, in the morning,
I am the ghost haunting myself.

 

Late in Life

Late in life
my father’s face
took on a new
countenance:
bewilderment
and rue.
It was surprising
for a man
who always
seemed in control.
Now, here
in my 70th year,
I find the same
look in
the mirror. And
I say to that face:
What are you
thinking? And,
how did I end up
here, in the same
place as my steady father?

 

Corey Mesler has been published in numerous anthologies and journals including Poetry, Gargoyle, Lunch Ticket, Five Points, Good Poems American Places, and New Stories from the South. He has published over 45 books of fiction and poetry.  With his wife he owns Burke’s Book Store (est. 1875) in Memphis.