Ben Hyland

Do you feed
a white peacock
by hand or
by hope? Hope
he finds a peahen,
hope he can fly again
to roost at night.
My wife and I
chose tap water
and blackberries,
watched him crash
each flight, a white
comet falling
in Florida. By dark,
he hid in our dense
brush. By day,
he fought and lost
to the others,
to the peacocks
sensing weakness,
needing to peck
at it, weed it out.
We built a wall
of potted plants
around our deck
to hide him.
We offered palms
of scrambled eggs.
Who owns
the neighborhood stray?
The Board held
an emergency meeting
to decide
if he dies, he dies.
Animal Control
couldn’t find a cage
big enough.
One random morning,
we saw nothing.
Hope for morning,
hope for shelter.
Even now, between
the deck’s wooden slats,
we see whirled feathers,
white eyes staring back.

——————

Fun fact: When I wrote this poem at the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic, I realized it was setting the stage for a longer collection of poems focused on the theme of needing safety and not having it. From there, I created the chapbook Shelter in Place and searched for a publisher.

Floor lamps, crib, bed,
couch legs. Black dirt frames

every corner of the carpet.
Note the difference

between shade and shadow:
a fist-sized wall hole,

a small closet of mold.
Curled cablesnakes,

ash ghosts in the fireplace.
I drain a dark lake

from the tub, watch it
loudly cyclone down.

Who owns this family
and their museum – me

or my company?
Years of skin flakes

suck and spit
through the intake,

swirl in diaper dust,
where light catches the dance.

——————

Fun fact: This poem is inspired by many of my real-life experiences as a property manager from 2008-2013.

And in that mouth,
in that black hole
of dangling stars,

I’m staring at so many things:
your teeth, pink inner-cheek, tongue.

That men could speak
of you
but not to you,
or to you
but not loudly –

a long moan I’ve heard from a long, anonymous body

towering over you.

And to that skin,
buffed, polished,
spotlit, I say
nothing –

to the spinal curve, nothing;
to the curled toes trembling in stilettos,
nothing.

——————

Fun fact: Hawai’i-Pacific Review originally published this poem in 2014 — my most “prestigious” publication credit to date.

snowblown streetlight
thin windshield
rosary beads sway

——————

Fun fact: Before I learned more about how to actually write Western haiku and re-imagined this poem, it was published as a pretty bad haiku in Wild Violet. Yikes! :)

No visions no sun no dreams – I measured every star counted every stair
where a hole in the floor is not a hole in the floor
and in that void I was spinning standing on a swivel chair

I saw the planes above the world from my office window I swear
there was a hole in the floor – a crevasse a creek an endless open door
no visions no sun no dreams – I measured every star counted every stair

for the world I could not speak a word nor have a hand to spare
the ceiling was a floor even when I moved toward the siren roar
in the City we were spinning Heaven bent to cradle air

the planes bent toward us too and all I did is stare
at the hole below the bottom of the floor below the footsteps at the front door
no visions no sun no dreams – I measured every star counted every stair

I learned how small the end of the world could be how planes fall everywhere
all that remained was a deep hole in the middle of what was before
I was still a child afraid to cross streets spinning my mother’s hair

each day since I wake on tarmac I breathe sunfuel I try a new prayer
walls turn to rain – where I felt a door it twists and exists no more
no visions no sun no dreams – I measured every star counted every stair
I am spinning watching Heaven and shaking in my chair

——————

Fun fact: The early versions of this poem are written in free verse, and they just never “clicked.” I couldn’t crack the code until 12 years later, when I realized that I could best communicate the circuitous nature of trauma through a poetic form that involves a lot of repetition — in this case, a villanelle.