Gregory Autry Wallace

Poetry

 

 

The Impossibility of Crows

 

Spirals of ash drift down

on the woodsman’s egg

Sun Maiden shies away

brilliant dashes of light

penetrate the green mist}

Henry’s planet:

a beautiful suicide.

The gaze in the dream

reveals the presence

of angels

dazzling radiance

recedes into

fluidity of childhood

where luminous patterns

of stardust scatter}

The geometry of inner space

unfolds in all directions

 

 

 

The Iris

 

He slipped his gun into

powdered nickels and dusty cigars

The girl’s body,

a distant sparkling point

police car rolls past

photoelectric cells

dark color of iris,

small bright teeth

with jade green shades)

man in a bloody Chinese coat -

pressure of a dark space beyond

becomes fleecy clouds.

crowds swarmed around

on either side -

world of catacombs

silver fish in the sun

motorcycle officer

stood under the arch

he stood very still,

his rough fingers

caught at her head.

she seemed to be unconscious -

a haze that held its

filmy texture

diffused light from the corridor,

glass eyes with their

tractor emerged

unhooked from the sun

 

 

 

As She Undressed

 

As she undressed,

he put his pistols

in front of her garments,

her face became pink

then white again

when she was naked,

she set the percolator aside

and came to the door,

blushed swiftly.

She brought her left hand

from behind her

and held it out

ran his fingers down a column,

dark lashed lids

over velvet eyes.

Both hands spread over her throat,

his face was yellow white

around glittering eyes -

she dropped her hands

and stood erect;

pressed the girl forward,

uncontained except for

inner darkness

a small girl whose face

was white and dim,

her throat was a firm curve.

 

 

 

Return of the Hesperides

 

The girl was transparent

save for soft floating eyes

a light went on and

she stood in darkness

her hair, radiant as sunbeams

 

I was in a great cone

spinning down to a black point

floating colors

calm fire of gems

blue light dancing

 

Dark craters surrounded

by shining halos

blue flashes pass before my eyes

multicolored dragons sear my brain

with phosphorescent flames

 

A girl with eyes like pools of fire

she bumps into high clouds

of pink moss,

a golden comet driven through her head

by fine spider webs of light

 

 

 

Quicksilver

 

Queen Persephone

shroud enveloping her form

squeezed from the cooling steel

roots of a pile driver

 

Dew covers my forehead

genesis of a nightmare

unencumbered by glass

in the darkness of my prison

 

The heavens are opened

dim and yellow light of the moon

ghosts of lovely women

 

Cut glass and majolica

bathed in grim steam

enchanted cat lost in

a labyrinth of glass

 

Cinderella dancing slowly with

guilty mutineers and pirates

Alice Liddell and the Penguin

wedded in a castle of ice

 

As soon as I drank the boiling blood

Psyche eagerly quickened her pace

like a spider dissolving in quicksilver

 

 

 

Gregory Autry Wallace is a poet, painter and collagist living in San Francisco. He studied English, World and Comparative Literature, and Creative Writing at San Francisco State University.  His poetry and collages have appeared in Athena Incognito, Atticus Review, Black Scat Review, BlazeVox and Five 2 One. He was a poetry editor for Ink Magazine and a founding editor of Oblivion Magazine. Mr. Wallace is the author of The Girl with Seven Hands and is currently working on a poetry collection.