Chandra Alderman

Mountain Ash

Outside the snow thick as fog.
A mountain ash in the distance.
Its branches shaking from the wind
and robins feeding on the berries.
Crimson beads falling on snow.
I think of your back,
as we stand in the shower
after untangling from the sheets.
Everything reminds me of you.
A snow plow passes by,
robins scatter, autumn leaves
caught in an updraft.
They vanish in the snow.
I close my eyes and blush
remembering our warm bodies,
damp from the shower,
lightly touching on the bed
by the window.


Stanley Kubrick

I’m driving home
lowering sun over my left shoulder.
It casts shadows of the bare trees,
guitar strings pulled taut
across the road. The rhythm of the car
moving over the shadows
takes me back to your attic.
We are piled on blankets, holding each other,
listening to Stanley Kubrick by Mogwai.
It might have been the drugs
or your gentle hands but every note
whispers love in my ear. These moments,
they come and find me, even in this desolate
salt-crusted winter landscape. The orange
lowering sun, the trees’ shadows
playing a song just for me.

Chandra Alderman lives in Northeast Ohio where she writes mostly letters and sometimes poetry. She is often seen out in the wild with a camera, spying on nature, everyday life, and writers. Her photography has been featured on chapbooks published by Nightballet Press and Crisis Chronicles Press, and also online at Thirteen Myna Birds, The City Poetry and The Octopus Review. Her poetry has appeared in Trailer Park Quarterly. More than all of this, she is trying to compose the perfect bowl of soup.