Rodney Nelson's poetry began appearing in mainstream literary journals long ago.
However, he turned to fiction and did not write a poem for twenty-two years, restarting in the electronic journals during this century. See his entry in the Poets & Writers directory for an outline of his publishing history. He has worked as a book and copy editor and lives in Roxana Saberi's hometown.DÉBORDEMENT
flood in March meant early but
the river seemed hurrying
when it went up
an ice raft
small on it and Canada
geese at the edge of a lawn
now
the river seemed leaving
and was not only from here
but only northward
seemed not
ready to add its volume
to itself until it reached
some point of engulfment be-
coming what Hagen would have
dumped more than a body in
une rivière rouge anyway
all wide now
unhurrying
HARBOR NIGHT
there had been saxophone on radio in
the apartment we drove away from toward
a known-or-not hill in a city that turned
rain port by day would not harbor lights or get
warm until that brown-purple evening when
we saw a row of them it had to do with
the hill we were coming to so knew or not
and we were old and very young
ahead would
be taillights in the road toward a dirt port
the memory of later music but the
night into which a hued evening had changed
would not change we were not very young and old
might have seen everything in that row of
lights on a known-or-not hill we were coming
to would be coming to or are we passing
TOWARD AUTUMN
monarch rallying in a butterflies' week
to hurry away together maybe flee
what would come
jigging in no one direction
now among heavy grass and ragweed in flower
to end with dragonflies' time a turning of
sumac by the hill and again an orange
dot
the monarch penultima
readying
to leave and whichever insect to drop an
egg the nodding grass to lay seed on the wind
until the fade at sundown but how many
uncommon merganser working anyway
a low dark flight of them
hurrying quiet
over the lake to be ahead of what would
come yet no one direction now or ever
to the dragonflying nor urgency
no
need to leave
only moving
to stay maybe
in the huge red granite somehow hoven out
of the gentle bottomland havening cacti
with aster come what might
butterfly and duck
not fleeing either not hurrying just
drawn away by what would draw egg and seed in