Anna Rugis


Lucifuga


               flee from this light

                               to Cuba
to the caves
which absorb memory
because it stinks and shimmers
like dead fish in the shallows
                               millions of them

the killing blast a slo mo explosion
of ignorance and revelry

               to dark matter

and filtered
like water through limestone

no ransom no future

               to disarray

sunk and strewn



Love the Calculator


when possessions consort
in the absence of their owners
as if to counterfeit events
that haven’t happened
as if it’s possible
to spin out lives
in impossible realms

intentions/inattentions
enough to finance
an act of will in one world
a willing act in another



Carriers


ones with ideas
               and keys

and colours
that flow from their brushes
as they need them to startle
with counterpoint and timbre

their improvisations
               Corelli, Corea
sheet-music in a high wind
float and reach

up to outcrops
beneath glowering mountains

               their progressions
like old folk tunes carried forward
flatten and roll up neatly
behind their heels

always onward always
delivery driven
they know ways to get places
and trailing behind them

               hyenas
with blood on their chops
wait for night to fall



Anna Rugis's poems have been included in Poetry Aotearoa, JAAM, brief, Broadsheet, Snorkel, Takahe, Poetry NZ, Catalyst, LYNX magazine (USA), and International Literary Quarterly, UK.
She also writes songs and musicals with environmental themes for children and is a former backup singer for Van Morrison, Cat Stevens, and The Kinks. She has recorded 10 CDs of original music including Reconciliation, Cave Songs, Traffic in Gold and Light As.
 
 
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