Poems by Kasey Jueds
Catechism with Moth Holes and Beaver Pond
To take up the blue
sweater, moth-chewed, to mouth
the words of the hymn without
sound. Locate me: a cup
awaiting milky tea, refusing
to call the dead
irises ghosts, my finger tracing
each hole’s ragged edge.
———Portage, a carrying
place, where the maples’ north-facing trunks
blazed with lichen.
———White-green-silver, the words
that come or don’t. How we steadied
ourselves then, against the footbridge
railing, bent over rough wood
for a glimpse of the dark
animal, just-gone, trembled
circles on the water drifting
out and out, both of us
waiting until they stilled. See, I have
brought you back
into this poem, I do not want
to live here alone.
The Vultures
Kasey Jueds is the author of two collections of poetry, both from the University of Pittsburgh Press: Keeper, which won the 2012 Agnes Lynch Starrett Prize, and The Thicket. Her work can be found in journals including American Poetry Review, Crazyhorse, Narrative, Beloit Poetry Journal, Ninth Letter, Cincinnati Review, Bennington Review, and Pleiades. She lives in a small town in the mountains of New York State.