I Stand Up by Allison Grayhurst

I stand up, everything

falls down, the load and the balance

on a soft bed of nothingness to catch

and embrace in a cruel dream

of freedom.

           I draw my breath in the rising wave,

knowing the calm waters are too lonely

for sustenance.

This has butchered my means of survival,

drowning my body in acid-mud.

This has rounded out the edges, so

like a hard ball, I am tumbling down

an incline that stretches out

to a cliff with fast momentum,

no chance of halting or even slowing down.

           I found a piece of joy in day-to-day service

and must pay with blood flow, extreme heat and drought,

pay and never have a day without survival’s worrisome

stranglehold gnawing out my intestines, making holes

here, serious as death, serious

as an asteroid breaking the atmosphere,

thinning my faith and all I hold sacred,

tying it down on a large rock, trying me up

on a large rock, in slow decomposition,

waiting the buzzard’s peck and sting.

About the Poet:

Allison Grayhurst is a member of the League of Canadian Poets. Five times nominated for “Best of the Net,” she has over 1375 poems published in over 525 international journals. She has 25 published books of poetry and 6 chapbooks. She lives in Toronto with her family. She also sculpts, working with clay; www.allisongrayhurst.com

              Collaborating with Allison Grayhurst on the lyrics, Vancouver-based singer/songwriter/musician Diane Barbarash has transformed eight of Allison Grayhurst’s poems into songs, creating a full album entitled River – Songs from the poetry of Allison Grayhurst, released 2017.

              Some of the places her work has appeared in include Parabola (Alone & Together print issue summer 2012); SUFI Journal (Featured Poet in Issue #95, Sacred Space);Elephant Journal; Literary Orphans; Blue Fifth Review; The American Aesthetic; The Brooklyn Voice; Five2One; Agave Magazine; JuxtaProse Literary Magazine, Drunk Monkeys; Now Then Manchester; South Florida Arts Journal; Gris-Gris; Buddhist Poetry Review; The Muse – An International Journal of Poetry, Storm Cellar, morphrog (sister publication of Frogmore Papers); New Binary Press Anthology; Straylight Literary Magazine (print); Chicago Record Magazine, The Milo Review; Foliate Oak Literary Magazine; The Antigonish Review; Dalhousie Review; The New Quarterly; Wascana Review; Poetry Nottingham International; The Cape Rock; Ayris; Journal of Contemporary Anglo-Scandinavian Poetry (now called The Journal); The Toronto Quarterly; Existere; Fogged Clarity, Boston Poetry Magazine; Decanto; White Wall Review.