The train moves far below this tower room
with a sound like a slowly drawn-out gunfire,
a strangely underworld story
unfolding—a question to an answer, coming apart
inside the mind. In the landscape of God’s ceaseless
memory, human thought grows backward and turns
from snow into time. In those outer fields, forgotten prayers
are common as dustgrains, and shreds of hope
define themselves on a background of burning seeds
and jagged hail. At a certain point, joy becomes an answer
to ongoing silence, like the peace of a star as it begins
collapsing, a spellbound amnesia returning to the heart,
and leaves of grief becoming rain on the rail line.
Alexander Etheridge has been developing his poems and translations since 1998. His poems have been featured in The Potomac Review, Museum of Americana, Ink Sac, Welter Journal, The Cafe Review, The Madrigal, Abridged Magazine, Susurrus Magazine, The Journal, Roi Faineant Press, and many others. He was the winner of the Struck Match Poetry Prize in 1999, and a finalist for the Kingdoms in the Wild Poetry Prize in 2022. He is the author of, God Said Fire, and the forthcoming, Snowfire and Home.
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THE CITY KEY 