Spaniels swim. Spooked geese fly. The river flows.
Under the full moon’s eye, the river flows.
Love breaks down like rotting fruit. The Mountain
Goats sing, I hope you die. The river flows,
yellow with chemicals. On its bank, kids
play. My daughter asks why the river flows.
Dreams offer reversals—the air clean, Mom
alive. From low to high, the river flows.
The sun sets on today’s rage. Over reeds
where bloated bodies lie, the river flows.
An abundance of ducks. My loneliness.
As we turns back to I, the river flows.
So many metaphors for penis size.
The puffed-up despot gloats, My river flows
fastest, holds gold fish. Masked men creep at night
to plunder his supply. The river flows,
keeper and cause of the drowned dead. Without
remorse or alibi, the river flows.
After a summer of muddy trickles,
joyful villagers cry, The river flows!
Tan house, fetid with arguments, where we
played pirate, soldier, spy. The river flows
from childhood to repetition. Last leaves
on stark fall branches sigh. The river flows.
Our love’s ribbon snipped, we fight and wander.
Through a field shorn of rye, the river flows.
Stone wets her feet at the familiar bend.
Whatever is awry, the river flows.
No Matter What by Alison Stone | Lemon Poetry Reed Diffuser
Alison Stone has published nine full-length collections, including Informed(NYQ Books, 2024), Dazzle (Jacar Press, 2017), Ordinary Magic, (NYQ Books, 2016), Dangerous Enough (Presa Press 2014), and They Sing at Midnight, which won the 2003 Many Mountains Moving Poetry Award; as well as three chapbooks. Her poems have appeared in The Paris Review, Poetry, Ploughshares, Barrow Street, Poet Lore, others. She has been awarded Poetry’s Frederick Bock Prize, New York Quarterly’s Madeline Sadin Award, and The Lyric’s Lyric Prize. She is also a painter and the creator of The Stone Tarot.
