The Rail
Fiction, nonfiction, and poetry from our favorite emerging writers
Dear Readers, After a brief hiatus to release Late Stage, gather our thoughts, and do some spring cleaning, The Rail is back this week to bring you three beautiful poems by New York writer Nicolette Reim. Thank you for sticking with us, readers and writers! We couldn't do it without you. -The Derailleur Press team GIRAFFE The giraffe never met D. H. Lawrence but knew instinctively no form of love is wrong as long as it is love and you yourself honor what you have to do. Love has an extraordinary variety of forms and that is all there is in life it seemed to me nibbling leaves gently above a tree. THIS IS A LOVE STORY
The gander had a big orange bump on an orange beak, charlotte-russe feathers whipped up on a white rump, forsaken in a bad situation, taken to a sanctuary where a female goose used to solitary wandered. His honk, hot honky-tonk, grabbed her attention. She catapulted, loosed from a calaboose, a flap, flap, flap, bowling ball in a straight direction, shuttlecock slam dunked. Neck to neck, they intertwined, a twisting tryst. Some insist they knew each other, two birds recalling fused a never-forgot-you knot, perhaps, perhaps not. A glance, meeting by chance, thumping hearts sense fate that haply lasts, sidetrack the wrecked world THROUGH THE MOTIONS Could be me, not so young, trundling along with a shopping cart-- _______________________________________________________________________________________________________ a cat lady bringing her pet to St. Mark’s “Blessing of the Animals.” Thy is your kingdom, thy will be done, but she isn’t famous, won’t become in New York City. On her way to get somewhere fast with new rules of social distancing, forgot her mask, passes a stranger who splays himself dramatically against a wall. On her right a woman, seemingly ice skating, makes a semicircle, six feet wide. Bumping a man, he asks for change. She yells, HOW MUCH CHANGE DO YOU WANT EVERYTHING HAS CHANGED WE’RE GOING CRAZY WITH CHANGE I DON’T DO CHANGE ANYMORE. They both turn away and leave. Nicolette Reim is a poet, visual artist, and translator who has been published in Mojave River Review, Pittsburgh Poetry Review, Glint Literary Journal, and other publications. She studied art at The New York Studio School and creates visual art pieces based on abstractions from writing and topography. Nicolette is a member of Noho M55 Gallery. She has also studied with poets Alicia Ostriker, Ellen Doré Watson, Michael Waters, and Judith Vollmer and holds a master’s degree in the Life Sciences from Columbia University and a Master of Fine Arts in Poetry with a Concentration in Translation from Drew University.
1 Comment
Ernest Gusella
5/17/2022 07:03:57 pm
Beautiful poems involving references to creatures from the natural world. These inhabitants of this spinning ball of dust, have been around a lot longer than we have, and have something going on beneath the surface that humans don't comprehend. Unfortunate for us! Aspects of 'civilization' contaminate us all. Native cultures of course do understand and and honor the animals, birds, and fish whose existence they have lived off of for thousands of years. Nicolette Reim's poems reflect an understanding of these facts.
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