Publishing Exceptional Poetry Since 2004
UNDETERMINED SPELL AGAINST ELEGY
by robert balun
I am thinking to when I will have seen
a monarch butterfly for the last time
a scrap of black plastic drifts
and almost looks like a crow
each day I disappear into the hiving
colony
collapse
disorder
what is happening
in the spaces between language
amid the alien corn
how can I explain it
the labyrinthine architecture of the dream
dreaming of itself
against the reality of that which is irreplaceable
today I see a honey bee climb inside a morning glory
so far it disappears
how can I explain it to you
​
Notes:
“amid the alien corn” is from Ode to a Nightingale by John Keats
Robert Balun is an adjunct professor at The City College of New York, where he teaches creative writing and literature. He is the author of the poetry collections Acid Western (The Operating System) and Traces (Ursus Americanus Press). His poems have appeared in Reality Beach, Powder Keg, TAGVVERK, Tammy, Prelude, Barrow Street, Apogee, Cosmonauts Avenue, and others. He is also a union delegate for City College, and a PhD student in English at Stony Brook University.