Malak Mattar, Untitled (detail), 2024, charcoal on paper
Great Basin
Poetry by Ian Harris
The car boiled over
on a perished piece of desert
it was a black Saab
beached in the stars
I slept two peaceful hours
on bitterbrush
before following
sag of power lines
to a circus tent
glowing by itself
camphor yellow
cindery bodies moving inside
I didn’t open the tent flap
but I warmed my hands on the blurry gypsies
balancing on ponies
swallowing swords
like the complicated
lattice of a campfire
Published:
| Online 2005

Ian Harris
Ian Harris lives in Portland, Oregon, with his wife and son. His work has appeared in The Kenyon Review, The Black Warrior Review, Jubilat, and Court Green. (updated 2009)
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