after Max Ernst
by KATE PARTRIDGE
The thing is (a blessing),
the gate is already open. Its red arm
gestures beyond
the frame like a gracious host from the
universe—one outside
of terror. What does a gate do but let us
pass or teach us
to climb? You’ll see: that woman running
through the field, a butcher’s
knife longer than her arm? She can lay it down.
The hunched, faceless
man preparing to leap from the rooftop
out to the cabinet
handle? He’ll make it, too. Then, the long-haired child
abreast in his
arms will, at last, steal the chance to look
back—how the sky descends
into light, clarity. She will always be
a person from fear,
but not (thank the nightingale) within it.
From Issue 12
KATE PARTRIDGE is the author of two poetry collections: THINE (Tupelo, 2023) and Ends of the Earth (University of Alaska, 2017). Her poems appear in FIELD, Yale Review, Pleiades, Michigan Quarterly Review, Copper Nickel, and other journals. She is an assistant professor of English at Regis University in Denver.