Poem by Julie Poole

Lavandula vera

together
       all wisps
    listing out
    what joyful dead
aroma a heat
a memory
in order to fit
a joint
   is Bent
the ending where
    the flowers happen
    living they were
          bluish
dead they are sage
    still harboring
     sun light
    in a vein
Lavandula vera
    6 figures cannot
compare
Lavandula vera
    my lovely
under magnification
a structure appears
    a puppet fabric
but sparkling
    a soft but
      not soft
      glistening felt
       spotted
    “This is where the
          scent pockets are”
the leaf that comes
  with it a leathery ear
          fine haired
       and cracked
    like a desert
     crushed I notice
            the yellow
           small tubes
       ridges of almonds
           a grainy texture
               Sea – music
                     somewhere

Julie Poole received a BA from Columbia University and an MFA from the New Writers’ Project at the University of Texas. In 2017, she was a finalist for the Keene Prize for Literature. She will be a writer-in-residence at Yaddo in 2019. Currently living in Austin, she is a bookseller at Malvern Books.

Photographer Jennifer Matthews’ poetry has been published in Nepal by Pen Himalaya and locally by the Wilderness Retreat Writers Organization, Midway Journal, The Somerville Times, Ibbetson Street Press and Boston Girl Guide. Jennifer was nominated for a poetry award by the Cambridge Arts Council for her book of Poetry Fairy Tales and Misdemeanors. Her songs have been released nationally and internationally and her photography has been used as covers for a number of Ibbetson Street Press poetry books and has been exhibited at The Middle East Restaurant, 1369 Coffeehouses, Sound Bites Restaurant in Somerville and McLean Hospital.