LANA BELLA

RIVERING

My skin is a river recedes in tides

from age, flashes of malaise take

to air with long wings of autumn 

sparrows. Quiet but for the water,

I warm back into the knitted-back

chair, inspect shapes of whirligig

in the Salinas wind. By the stroke

of lightning, nocturne is the baleful 

groove of legs lurching into woods, 

until I hear the quiet shifting from

which every breath moves, slicking

beneath bone like a mercy. In an

hour, I will dormant-reek more tree

bark than syrup of cloves, fingers

lean silver on a cigarette like a vice

of Calla Lilies, leaking petals, before

I’m fleshed by the memory of water.

TULLE OF EUPHONY

Wisps of morning brought in 

slim sequences, more or less 

dearing to the spring-coiled

blonde, wings earned from tulle

of euphony. Shy goblins grew

white in tent of grass, tussock

paled what errant fingers gloved,

hatched the porcine lace pearling

her skin. By strength of egress, 

she was loose limbs made still,

something lighter than a feather

settled, so haunting that breath

compressed like an arrow tipped

with want yet redrew its teeth,

recessed to the gospel of howls

she licked to seal.

A four-time Pushcart Prize, five-time Best of the Net & Bettering American Poetry nominee, Lana Bella is an author of three chapbooks, Under My Dark (Crisis Chronicles Press, 2016), Adagio (Finishing Line Press, 2016), and Dear Suki: Letters (Platypus 2412 Mini Chapbook Series, 2016), has had poetry and fiction featured with over 450 journals, Acentos Review, Comstock Review, EVENT, Ilanot Review, Notre Dame Review, Rock and Sling, The Stillwater Review, Sundress Publications & Whiskey Island, among others, and work appeared in Aeolian Harp Anthology, Volume 3. 

Lana resides in the US and the coastal town of Nha Trang, Vietnam, where she is a mom of two far-too-clever-frolicsome imps.