Three Poems by Mary Anna Scenga Kruch

 

Jammed  

 

It holds you captive 

even as you blaze 

inside 

 

these sparks snuffed 

one after another 

and you are  

 

slowly    spinning    your 

uneven surfaces 

scratching 

 

the playback    hovering 

over the gap 

between      

 

tracks    skip-ping    skip-ping     

skip-ping a beat      

jammed 

 

but why not flip the record ?   

play a new song? say 

something else? 

 

write an instrumental 

rather than a ragged  

rock song? 

 

 

Burnt Paper 

 

I walk the track 

along the creek 

where a silent cloud 

of dragonflies 

parts for me 

and I am aware 

of wisps of cloud 

aflame in your world: 

 

the fragrance of burnt paper  

blows up from your fire 

and I am with you. 

 

 

Lines 

 

The elegant design  

we had fashioned 

begins to fade 

into faint pencil lines 

of silence 

while the rest of the world 

seems drawn in ink  

loud 

and so deep 

so detailed  

that trellised rosebuds  

are seen from a mile away 

where the trees grow 

close enough  

to block the sun 

 

the dots scatter 

in a cradle of dirt 

where only a stubborn breeze 

like the ghost of my mother 

can lift them 

nudge them forward  

 

to an upswing of breath 

that fills my lungs 

fills unfinished thoughts  

boldens lines 

echoes suggestions 

of design.

Mary Anna Scenga Kruch is an educator and writer inspired by social justice, the natural world, and her Italian ancestry. She has published a poetry chapbook, We Draw Breath from the Same Sky (2019), a full-length collection, Grace Notes: A Memoir in Poetry & Prose (2021), and a new book, Water Marks (2024). Walking the fields of her father’s family farm near Pofi, Italy and at her husband’s family farm in Northern Michigan promote peace and a healing mindset from the effects of physical assault and disabilities. Recent poetry appears in The Awakenings Review and Meat for Tea.