Frontier: A Definition

Poetry by Iris Jamahl Dunkle

 

“Patterns of Privilege: Bodies of Nature 2” © Kathleen Caprario; used by permission

Frontier: A Definition

1.

A border is porous     [slipstream]

We used to swim under
     river’s green skin
          dapple of tree’s reach

under water violence
     is muffled. Current
          never caught us

citizens of the same cool
     stream, under sun’s glare
          weaving with cries of bird in air.

2.

Historically: pistol-fisted    a band of wasteland     between    settled

and primitive            outpost built       from clear-cut    and cleaved bodies.

Lay down the steel sentence.       On which slides                [steel] [weight]

A front line     woven with erased footsteps across         Natchez Trace—

 

3. A safety valve lets off steam. Without it. Explosion. A million splinters that pierce—

4. Wilderness looked back at us. Green teeth. Eyes blinking. We had no name that suited it.

5.

A border, continuous [a moving line]

Now the river stops
     its quiet speech
          with stone teeth

no more threading
     our bodies through
          its depths and shadows

   under muffle of water’s passage
           we’ve lost our common tongue
                   under sandy shoal—

6.

A border is a way of life.

7.

We seek the ocean
     to find the edge
          of ourselves.

Perhaps waves will
     satiate this churn
          of desire. Border

that time chews.
     Everything conquerable
          except ourselves. Lone

fort. Mishap of raw
logs. Secrets stoking
the hearth—

“Patterns of Privilege: Past Present 1” (edited) © Kathleen Caprario; used by permission

 

 


Art Information

Iris Jamahl DunkleIris Jamahl Dunkle was the 2017-2018 Poet Laureate of Sonoma County, California. Her newest poetry collection, West : Fire : Archive, is forthcoming from the Center for Literary Publishing in 2021. Her other poetry collections include Interrupted Geographies (Trio House Press, 2017), Gold Passage (Trio House Press, 2013), and There's a Ghost in This Machine of Air (Word Tech, 2015). Dunkle teaches at Napa Valley College and is the poetry director of the Napa Valley Writers’ Conference. She wrote the first full-length biography of Charmian London, Jack London's wife—Charmian Kittredge London: Trailblazer, Author, Adventurer—published by the University of Oklahoma Press in Fall 2020.

For more information, visit Iris Jamahl Dunkle's website or follow her @irjohnso on Twitter.

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