by Matt A. Hanson
from a dimming bow the high bright clouds cumulate / shades of light
orange descending / gray blues / mountains faded against sharp stone
bare seafront foundations giving way to the dark green / dusk-lit forests
as still as the mast of a lone sailboat / white in the distance, surrounded
islands of patchwork vegetation / eroded by the slow ties of earth
as the lip of sunlight moves up to the tops of cloudburst / disappearing
against the silhouetted backdrop of the Aegean coastal highlands
and there are slight waves / barely perceivable / passing as human voices
carrying over the bay / silenced by the omnipotent air / by the sloping hills
prostrating before inspirations / timeless / watery subconscious lusts
consuming every last wonder of the whole environment / one greedy gulp
Poseidon, Zeus, and Dionysus meet / become what it is / alive sea being
sky and land itself in the eye of a human seer / desirous / caring for a seed
once dropped by shrieking gulls / visiting white-winged strokes over the cliffs
brown and reddish before the rough unfinished sand / a landscape of water
and earth clasped with its fluid ancestor / erotic love affair beginning
as they were when the sky was made / sheltering them as children
to make themselves into one / other unity / altogether
that is us / as the sailboat once in the distance nears to join those who will stay
the night in the cove / dining and laughing / the universe on our tongues
thrown off in one defiant spit / that it is ours / watching as the sky breathes
throughout its drops / remaking every twig and stone / gone in a gust
vanished in a blink / as clouds unseen above the unmoving earth of rock
Minaret Vista Mammoth Mountain California
by Lawrence Bridges
Matt A. Hanson is a poet from Massachusetts based in Istanbul. The first of his ten-poem series, Blue Voyage, appeared in dipity. productions. This decade cycle is inspired by Azra Erhat, an early translator of classical Greek verse into modern Turkish. He archives his writings at FictiveMag.com.
Lawrence Bridges is best known for work in the film and literary world. His photographs have recently appeared in the Las Laguna Art Gallery 2023, Humana Obscura, the London Photo Festival, Light Space & Time Art Gallery, and the ENSO Art Gallery in Malibu, California. He created a series of literary documentaries for the National Endowment for the Arts “Big Read” initiative, which includes profiles of Ray Bradbury, Amy Tan, Tobias Wolff, and Cynthia Ozick. He lives in Los Angeles. You can find him on IG: @larrybridges
Ignatian Literary Magazine 