Desert, cities, suburbs, steeples: at my childhood’s core, mourning doves.
I, too, keen reflexively; what is a morning without mourning doves?
Describe a thing, like a toe in black Converse tracing a dust-circle.
The desert yields to circumference, as do the folding wings of a mourning dove.
Why “Joshua Tree”? Early Mormons saw in its shape the prophet praying.
Joshua lifted his arms to God—or, if I may—a mourning dove.
Everywhere, crystals. Adventurine, agate, quartz spires: $5.
My daughter drifts away from the market, distracted by mourning doves.
Ooo-whee hoo, hoo, hoo, indeed. My song is in your throat,
I telepathize to the mourning dove.
Describe the thing. The wine last night tasted of lemons
in the terroir. Or was it the tang of the mourning dove?
Jo, you are no sister of pigeon; the closest you get to flying is riding a bike.
Never mind: you are an oceanic drunk, like the dear mourning dove.
This poem first appeared in Temporary Beast (2024).
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Joanna Solfrian is the author of the poetry collections Temporary Beast, The Second Perfect Number, The Mud Room, and Visible Heavens, which was chosen by Naomi Shihab Nye for the Wick First Book Poetry Prize. Her poems have appeared in The Harvard Review, Boulevard, Rattle, Margie, The Southern Review, Salamander, Pleiades, Image, and elsewhere. She is a MacDowell Fellow and a five-time Pushcart nominee. Joanna lives and works in New York City. www.joannasolfrian.com
