Moonrise, Adiyaman


Six thousand year old city
in motion, it's torn up, torn down,
rebuilt again. Great hammers and picks
seize chunks of pavement,
grind a roadway into bits—
the air spread with dust so thick

that when risen from behind
an obscured horizon,
the full moon is a colossus.
Almond honey, powdered blood,
a poppy's silk all pressed
in one numinous globe.

Moon of the Mesopotamian Plain,
of Euphrates, Mithridates,
older than our word for light.
Moon of Ur, wider
than the ancient world,
level with our eyes.


                                  —Paulann Petersen

Blood-Silk, Quiet Lion Press, 2004

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