Ellen Austin-Li

poet and writer
Ellen Austin-Li
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    Poetry

    Hive Boxes

    https://ellenaustinli.files.wordpress.com/2018/12/recording-of-Wild-hive.m4a

    Wild Hive

    A rumble summoned my husband last spring
    to rescue a beehive; he found it
    hung like a tongue abuzz with hunger,
    urgent hooligans hunkering around
    a honeyed crux. He clipped the bunched
    cluster, curried the tree branch, and dumped
    it into a hovel.

    He had three hives at the beginning
    of winter, but only the mined line
    survived this time. He thinks

                  there’s something in being wild
                  that keeps things alive.

    *published in Pine Mountain Sand and Gravel, Fall 2018, Issue 21,
    “Appalachia Acting Up.”

    Photo credit Rebecca Goodall
    https://ellenaustinli.files.wordpress.com/2018/12/Recording-Sliver-of-Power.m4a

    Sliver of Power

    We sheltered from August steam under fluttering oak leaves,
    crescent moon shadows multiplying at our feet.
    As moon began to overtake sun, we
    stepped beyond shade to stand
    where we were scorched
    just moments before—
    it was as if we stood
    the same ground
    on a different day,
    twenty degrees cooler,
    the sun’s light filtered
    to a temperature more akin
    to an autumn afternoon. Light
    slipped from summer’s buttery yellow
    to silvery sheen, the supernatural glow before
    violent thunderstorms; birdsong silenced and crickets
    soon filled the void with nighttime chirping. We hushed
    as moon slid across sun, yet marveled at the power of sun,
    who gave so much light with the smallest fraction of herself.

    *published in The Amethyst Review, Nov.9,2018. 
    https://amethystmagazine.org/2018/11/09/sliver-of-power-a-poem-by-ellen-austin-li/

    Awakening

    “This sense of clean and beautiful newness within and without is one
    of the commonest entries in conversion records… And that such
    a glorious transformation as this ought of necessity
    to be preceded by despair …”
                                       -William James in The Varieties of Religious Experience

    Without ghost lines of turned-down pages,
    I pulled the unread book from its wedged perch,
    opened to a tale written by a drunk sage.
    Without ghost lines, no turned-down pages,
    I unlocked the door of my cage—
    from weathered story sprung the answer to my search.
    Without ghost lines of turned-down pages,
    I awakened in this printed church.

    *published in The Amethyst Review, Oct. 24, 2018

     https://amethystmagazine.org/2018/10/24/awakening-a-poem-by-ellen-austin-li/

    Firefly

    Last night a firefly was trapped
    inside my bedroom, frantic
    fluorescence, neon green
    darting, looking for escape;
    moments of illumination
    were dashes across a black page.
    I opened the screen door,
    tried to show her the way
    to freedom, how easy it would be
    to regain her life,
    but the firefly flew
    deeper into a trap,
    further inside
    her dark prison.

    *published in an earlier version in Artemis, Spring 2018

    Thirteen Ways of Looking at Cowboy Boots
    (Hat Tipped to Wallace Stevens)

    I.
    Among the crowd of footwear
    standing in her closet,
    she chooses the androgynous black cowboy boots.

    II.
    She was of two minds,
    like her stylish yet functional
    leather cowboy boots.

    III.
    Despite their advancing age, the cowboy boots emitted
    the musky aroma of a new buck.

    IV.
    A woman and a pair of shoes
    are one.
    A woman and her pair of cowboy boots
    are at least two.

    V.
    She doesn’t know which she prefers,
    the seductress in high-heeled boots,
    or the shit-kicking, tough-talking cowgirl
    ruling in her cowboy boots,
    or both

    VI.
    Fine lines etched her mirrored reflection
    with unforgiving age.
    The polished gleam of the cowboy boots
    passed her eye, caught her attention.
    She hesitated at the shine of the easily-renewed boots,
    an indescribable sadness weighed her down.

    VII.
    O Cowboys of the Wild West,
    could you have imagined over a hundred years hence a gentlewoman
    wearing your boots, prancing around, shopping, dancing, loving
    in the boots you rode brokeback saddle in?

    VIII.
    She knows a virile Western twang and the Southern drawl
    of a charmer, the rugged outdoorsy cadences of some men;
    but she knows, too, the lilting feminine voice of a Northern girl,
    and she is definitely wearing cowboy boots.

    IX.
    When the cowboy boots are put away,
    the imprint of their power remains
    on her choices.

    X.
    At the sight of her pulling-on her black or tan cowboy boots,
    even the critics of haute couture
    applaud her versatile fashion sense.

    XI.
    She drove all over the Midwest
    in a black minivan.
    Once, she cried she was lost,
    alone in this stampede.
    The cut of her boot reminded her
    to start walking.

    XII.
    The river is moving.
    Her cowboy boots must be mud-streaked by now.

    XIII.
    Her whole, tired life was a new frontier.
    She was breathing,
    and she willed to keep breathing.
    Her cowboy boots kicked-up the dust under her feet
    as she walked into the sunset.

    *published on “The Poet’s Craft,” the website of Pauletta Hansel, during her tenure as Cincinnati’s 1st poet laureate.

    Cocoon

     By the bottle or by the pill,
    fueled for isolation;
    brick and mortar added to the wall
    growing stronger every day.
    Needles spin
    webs inside skulls.
    Gold and paper
    pad the nest
    of voices too bright
    for our nighttime eyes.
    Chrysalis shells
    calcify,
    reverse metamorphosis,
    as desiccated wings
    flake-off,
    brains wither
    and hardened bodies
    cocoon.

    *Published in L.A. Writers Tribe Review

    Cameo Moon

    This evening a full moon,
    cameo white,
    hung low in the inky sky,
    as if too heavy to rise
    above the torches of industry
    burning just below.
    An inescapable chill
    inhabited me today;
    scapular muscles contracted
    in aching protest, as if
    my wings were paralyzed
    by the cold.
    Weighted,
    I sink into the warmth
    of minerals suspended.
    Am I, too, destined
    to remain tethered low,
    like the moon?
    My icy body thaws
    as the bath water cools;
    I replenish the heat
    in a protracted reverie,
    muscles loosening
    in the solace of water.
    I return to the moon,
    now bright white
    and risen high in its inevitable arc.
    I walk briskly in the blue light,
    exhaling puffs of clouds, my body
    holding warmth despite the winter air,
    again hopeful for the possibility
    of ascent.

    *Published on the Public Library of Cincinnati & Hamilton County’s website. A winner of the 2016 “Through the Garden” poetry contest co-sponsored by the Greater Cincinnati Writers League. 

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