Salt

Liz Tilton

• Publisher: The Kent State University Press
• Year: 2009
• eBook ISBN: 9781612775708
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: American Poetry
• Index: Literature

"A clear, seemingly effortless voice and a special curiosity animate the world Liz Tilton gives us in Salt. And it is a world, ranging from domestic life—loose change, gardening, the intricacies of love—to manatees and the governor of Texas. Discoveries abound. Salt is smart, subtle, and essential." —Don Bogen

"Never coy or mincing, Liz Tilton's poems burst open our doors to swagger forth with announcements on their lips, announcements that promise a world that is at once familiar with the 'houseguests or in-laws' who threaten to live in our basements (and whose approach is denied), and yet refuses total fidelity to realism, as the speaker continues to rise above us, a 'cowgirl / hovering above the horehound ground, / leather holsters strapped with a big buckle, / helium riding high on [her] hips.' The bold, buoyant poems of Salt shimmy 'up to the mike stand' to sing our heats in forward and reverse." —Cate Marvin

II.

It sings
salt sings, the skin
of the salt mines
sings
with a mouth smothered
by the earth.
—Pablo Neruda, “Ode to Salt”

ALTO

The composer whittles his quill,
fills it with opera, and writes me a note.
“Sing it,” he says, but even the river

quivers at my timidity. He sees the problem,
coats the pen again, cups my chin,
then inks my mouth into a perfect oval

until my solo echoes from the hills
on an opposite shore. A river of voices
floods me, reaches for a high note, pulls it down,

and pounds it smooth against the bottom
stones, then lets it bubble up, heavier
with the weight of water. Soon, I’m orchestrating

the chorus with a stolen baton; but I hold
the low tones too long, enjoy their rumbling
in my body, annoying the composer

who blackens the oval closed
with his laden quill. I lick the sticky silence
from my lips and taste where the music was.

THE DESERT IS NOT FOR SISSIES

If I could move I would follow
the cottonwood shade. It teases the limestone
like a lover’s feather. It doesn’t promise

oasis. A stranger hikes alone but stops
beside me to bathe his blistered feet,
his single painted nail in the roaring springs.

I focus on his middle toe—remember it
aqua, bony. I can’t look up. I lean toward
the cool water, his opened canvas bag, watch him

peel an orange, unfold it with his thumbs.
The scent tickles me, it rallies the clouds, wakes
the scorpions into flicking their tails

and dancing sideways around me. I swoon
for a dripping slice. He wipes his fingers
across the Vishnu Schist. Petroglyphs shift.

Reds, purples, yellows unravel from canyon
shadows, hiss against the scorching rocks.
If I could move, I would follow.

BRUSH ME IN

I slip on the oily trail, skin my knee
on purple, and catch myself
at the canvas edge. My boots are covered
in morning orchid. Dawn hasn’...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Content
• Acknowledgments
• I.
• II.