Post by thepoetslizard on Oct 10, 2008 16:00:01 GMT 2
Ivy Alvarez is the author of Mortal (Red Morning Press, 2006). Her poetry is featured in anthologies, journals and new media in many countries.
The recipient of numerous awards, prizes and residencies, Ivy Alvarez has received funding towards her second book of poems from both the Australia Council and the Welsh Academi.
In 2006, Wales Arts International supported her participation in the Red Room Company’s The Poetry Picture Show in Sydney, Australia. Fundación Valparaíso has also invited her to attend a writing residency in Spain during April 2008.
In 2005, she received prestigious residency fellowships from MacDowell Colony (USA) and Hawthornden Castle (UK). She also accepted an Arvon Foundation bursary and the honour of Special Poetry Guest to Dublin’s Trinity College/Florida International University poetry summer program in 2004. Her poem ‘earth’ appears in the 2004 Australian/Pacific Region Literacy Placement Test for Scholarships, initially selected from the anthology Moorilla Mosaic: Contemporary Tasmanian Writing.
www.ivyalvarez.com
"moth"
pale white body against the glass
wings pressed towards the light
I am a pulse
I cannot stop beating, beating
so drawn to the alien thing
there is no time to care
the light beckons and I am there
call me ephemeral
soon the crickets will sing their cacophony
and the grass will have my dry wings
—from Mortal
*
"earth"
the rain loves the earth by extinguishing
the sweet burn of day, smoothes the dry furrows
with wet blunt fingers, signals each visit
by taps on the door. it does not forget
to wake the buried seeds warm in their beds,
gently thrums until each pokes out a head
first yellow. darkening when the sun comes
loam crumbs, brown earth melts under water's welts
succumbs to its cool press, the balm of day
gives up the shoots. the stems are gentle spears
beneath the disconnected leaves—
a trail,
a snail gnaws at the tender flesh of stems.
the raindrops follow the curve of its house
glint a sparkle and seep into the ground
—from Mortal
*
"lost flesh"
i
here's the bed she lies in
the sheets might as well be snow
she's so cold
the heat disperses above her
the ceiling blankly accepts it
she sinks clean as a stone
ii
when she wakes there's a scar
where a breast used to be
she shows it to me
excoriated and raw
her eyes shine
behind a dam of tears
iii
when we cross the street
she holds onto my hand
as if I was ten again
and things were still to happen
-- from MiPoesias
*
"auricle, ventricle"
sunlight stuns
the drowsy
gritty sand
you depart
or is it me
the flare of my skirt
your open mouth
tell the story
remember the start
that lunar pull
wave motion lulls
shift and sway
my lungs
ninety percent water
breathe in
all the watery years
the blue and the black
the stars
--from OBAN
