ap·o·tro·pa·ic – intended to ward off evil; from the Greek apotropaios, from apotrepein, to ward off : apo-, apo- + trepein, to turn.
What have you got, what have you got
to trade for my stash of bitter pains?
A hoard of bitterer greens to test
fortitude and the swallowing reflex.
Garlic for fevers trapped in the limbs.
Comfrey for the womb’s most complex pains.
Eucalyptus for ease of mind: then follow, follow.
Roselle, hibiscus, sorrel: names to brighten the tongue.
In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.
OTHER POSTS IN THE SERIES
- Cusp
- Interval
- Bel Canto
- Cures
- In the Summer Capital
- The Hourglass
- Glossolalia
- Frost has silvered the grass
- Fragment of a Poem Disguised as SPAM
- Clear bulb of coral inside a paper shade,
- This
- Lament
- Kissing the Wound
- Mythos
- Fire Report
- Intermission
- Dear animal of my deepest need, you want to linger
- Ghazal, a la Cucaracha
- Heartache Ghazal
- Rituals
- Founding
- Rift
- Devotions
- Ghazal: Some ways to live
- What heart heard of, ghost guessed:
- A single falling note above
- Precaution
- Flush
- Rotary
- La Caminata
- Paradiso
- Dear nearly weightless day,
- Chance
- Ghazal of the 1 o’clock caller looking for Pomona
- Breaking the Curse
- Instructive
- Flicker
- Milflores, Milflores
- Bad Script
- Ghazal of the Eternal Return
- Provisions
- Lavender
- Letter to the Underneath
- Stories
- Flickers
- Tall Ships
- Light
- Beneath one layer, another and
- Please
- Arbor
- Landscape, with Summer Bonfires
- Yield
- Fire-stealer
- Dear language, most thick