Waldgeist, and Sheathe, and Ignis Fatuus

Abstract

Waldgeist, and Sheathe, and Ignis Fatuus Allison Benis White (bio) Waldgeist The souls trappedin the trees in Dante’s forestof suicides can only speakwhen their branches are brokenas they bleed. What else is languagenow but injury: why did youbreak me? Why did you leave me? And relief: to bleedin one place, for one reason,to say I failed to livesanely on earthwithout you. [End Page 128] Sheathe Even in the dream,we lie awake in thedark, side by side. When I askif you’re dead, you say,Alive in your mind. And of the four truths,I remember two: we arealone, we will suffer. It’s no wonderwe cannot sleep. We cannot die,your cool handin my hand, carvedfrom ivory or ice. [End Page 129] Ignis Fatuus It is possible to belovely in the dark. A few thin treesleaning towardeach other. In ghost or palelight, my fingerson my lips. If to speak is to die,I will whisper. If to speak is to die,I will maketrees of my hands— I will say nothingby shivering, I willsay everything. [End Page 130] Allison Benis White Allison Benis White is the author of Please Bury Me in This (Four Way Books, 2017), Small Porcelain Head (Four Way Books, 2013), selected by Claudia Rankine for the Levis Prize in Poetry, and Self-Portrait with Crayon (CSU Poetry Center, 2009). She teaches in the Department of Creative Writing at the University of California, Riverside. Copyright © 2016 Middlebury College Publications