Pareesa Pourian
EUPATORIUM MACULATUM
Movement in my belly. Raindrops on the page. It is the green of august – a
sure, certain green. Gravel root, queen of the meadow, joe pye weed. A
medicine man, pink crowned, a root at work with minerals. The thunder
sounds like an amphitheater of minerals. Raindrops on my belly, movement on
the page. It is the sure green of august that makes up this world, just as the sure
pulse of my body makes up the world of an unborn baby. There is no rain or
green for her in this body. I have been welcomed into the world, next to this
steady and sure plant. The only thing that startles is the squeezed sound of
unseen frogs, like bodies squirting. She has stacks of palmate leaves, a hand
spread out, down a purple stalk, petals like newly formed hair. Bees are
snoozing, or dying on them. Rain lands on my wrist, my neck. Wrens are
getting fed, loudly. Thunder is a good sound, you can feel it. This baby doesn’t
know the sure green of august, or the drops of rain, but already she knows the
mineral tumble of thunder.
VERBENA HASTATA
This plant follows sound. Blue vervain purple throat, purple crown near a
stone’s gurgle near an eagle. It’s sound, not a song. The birds are drowned out
by the rush, the trucks make it through, engines roar and enervate but my skin
is pressed down by the sun, held down by a big stone. Cicadas have a sharp and
loud buzz, this is a plant with a clear loud buzz, open at the throat, purple
throat purple crown, sun fed purple pointing, like a curved finger, index finger
up, a purple point upwards towards whatever enters beyond the head’s narrow
spiral. How many heads are better than one? This isn’t a singular buzz. A head
does not create a chorus. It doesn’t matter what’s in the center if you’re part of
a hum. Purple fingers like a cramped hand reaching up to receive, not plucking,
just humming. Overtaken when an engine roars by, the absolute attention of a
machine enervates but does not follow the stream, the gurgle, the cold and
constant wash that our ears follow. It is a clutch of the sky, or what’s past it,
where space is purple, where space is strange, and there are no heads, but there
are hums.
SPIREA PRUNIFOLIA
Soft and refined but not delicate. Climbing like the vertical veins in an upright
body. An alternate patter, manicured paw, carrying bundles. Spirea, rose
cousin, silk plait, dark blue green, growing in measured lengths, sending out a
soft green inquiry, before the form sets. I feel like a soft green inquiry, a loose
gel, edges feathered. It’s not a question of personality when you pool. It is
mostly hydraulic, pumps and salts. Spirea is like fingers loosening a long braid
that doesn’t frizz in the humidity. I am all humidity, stretched and permeable
managing my fluids with fats and salts, thrumming liquids humming along to
the crickets. Curling skin, bundle of human encountering earth-bound
morphology pushing it this way and that, taking a rest with a foot on the face.
We remind ourselves to expand the chest, literally expand and grow
horizontally, hormonally into space, ribs move outwards to make room for my
new bodies. A puddle of gel doesn’t have a bra size, pooling onto pillows and
soft structured places. It’s ok to keep it soft, keep it calm. It is necessary to keep
it soft, keep it calm. Gels can’t be hard or they cease to be gel. A human can’t
move through you if your mold has set, a human can’t move through you if its
mold has set, two pools meet and stay loose for a while.
HYPERICUM PERFORATUM
St John’s Wort is sunshine. There are tiny wiggling bees about her flowers, the
long haired sun maiden flung her locks and knocked out one eye of Mr. Moon.
A silent moth on the thyme. Cars pass, water makes its rushing sound, a small
breeze moves things back and forth. I follow an itch, an itch leads me to tall
grass. I can’t see past it, I know there’s water. I know there’s a home we must
build. I know there’s something I’m supposed to teach. A mid-sized private
institution will pay me a small sum of money which I am to reallocate to
friends and strangers. The true purchase is time or rather the purpose of my
time which I am to focus then scatter and focus again in alternating rhythms.
This will drive me mad, but it is not meant to, it’s simply the way the thing is
done. I will lose my mind if I do not contain it. An endless mind will end me,
here, teeth, fingers, and kisses. A small child is alive in the world, arms and legs
wide riding a horse nude and bareback, the sun’s rays and sunflowers crossing
the threshold of her shelter, feathered, flagged, and smiling. I am hunched over,
trying to decipher, trying not to let words land, trying not to let words be
spoken or thoughts be thought, scrolling down towards one or another
thought’s frenzied proclamation. This is an unhappiness sunshine scorches.
Something is possible, even though my foot fell asleep, even against the wind,
even with a persistent itch. A robin fluffs his feathers. There are dollars debited
for each hour of time. Still, I can heave against them, my calculations, and lose
my focus, run fingers loose against the strands, entreat, politely wander, ask for
what I want. I can believe that what people need can be gently acquired.
VERONICA CHAMAEDRYS
I’m not trying to impress people, but people are impressed if I show up and if I
show up enough. My heart is impatiently beating out here, convincing and
unconvincing itself of accomplishment. Ballooning out into narrative voice
patched together with old tape that oozes or resists. The speedwell, Veronica, is
working her way up through her blossoms, petals slightly curled in with having
been around a while. The thin grass flower legs steal my focus, moving slight
lines, not too tall. Veronica a story below, dazzling purple eye sockets. Is it too
obvious to write that purple flowers with tiger eyes and stripes against the green
of early summer are really, really beautiful? Sometimes we need to hear it, even
if everybody knows it. Sometimes she needs to hear it. There are many blooms.
The beauty is in this spreading, a spread of eyes and angles, lengths and
clusters, pairings and forks. Two feet bloom on each rung of a ladder and fade
before the next one. I feel like I am failing, misunderstanding the ladder, it’s
not one. It’s just two pronouncements at a time, that die, and then two more.
You can see the gearing up and the falling away. Trying so hard is pointless, and
a little egotistical, as goes for admonishment.
Pareesa Pourian makes paintings, writes poetry, and studies herbalism. She received an MFA in Painting from Rutgers University and did her undergraduate studies in painting and philosophy at Louisiana State University. She is a member of Bushel Collective in Delhi, NY, and teaches art foundations at Hartwick College in Oneonta, NY.
