Across grazing hills
with Gerard Manley Hopkins
like a robot wind
all day
blows the banded noise
of us moving
Nailed to a little oak
I found a plaque
inscribed I have desired to go
I have heard god
loves me
but feel more like an empty
in the pushy hillwind
Where springs not fail
Grinding
flour from my
own warm bones
at 1:30 woke to worry
which doctors & how
To fields
Is it always the same time
in the freeway's
rebar spine
where flies no sharp and sided hail
The hills die in very slow
motion so many shades
of empty blond brown wan
And a few lilies blow
Belgium Tr.
Dan Alter has published poems and translations widely in journals including Field, Fourteen Hills, Pank, and ZYZZYVA. His collection My Little Book of Exiles, Eyewear Press, won the poetry prize for the 2022 Cowan Writer’s Awards. Hills Full of Holes, his second collection, will be published by Fernwood Press in 2025. He lives in Berkeley with his wife and daughter. www.danalter.net
Published April 15 2024