New Poetry by Tim Staley

Today They Open the Rio Grande   

                               - for Jon

Today they open the river

dusty arteries charge

as the old farmer in coveralls

races to the red wheel

to twist his own fields

full of muddy water.

Draped in his barn

under a heavy brown canvas

is a coffin lined with velvet

plump as ripe mulberries

but Jon, that’s not for you.

The moon like a tumor

grown to be sliced away.

The current says, I'll let you be,

to the cobweb in the reeds.

Each is impressed

with the other's impermanence.

Hold today’s Rio in your brain

rolling high in the grassy banks

on the gurney when they roll you in

like the Sea of Tranquility

holds that last gist of light

in its darkest hour. 

- Tim Staley 2016

Tim Staley was born in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1975. He completed a Poetry MFA from New Mexico State University in 2004. His first full-length volume of poetry is forthcoming from Pski’s Porch Publishing. His chapbooks are available for purchase at the Grandma Moses Press online store. Journal publications include Border Senses, Cacti Fur, Canary, Chiron Review, Circumference, Coe Review, Malpais Review, Magnapoets, RHINO: The Poetry Forum, and Sin Fronteras. His hobbies include thinking, taquitos, and waiting. Actually, just taquitos.  He lives with his wife and daughter in Las Cruces, New Mexico.