Cat's Tongue

Cat’s Tongue is the latest publication from California-based writer Kathleen Winter. These poems vary widely in style and subject matter, but they share precisely crafted language and this writer’s unique perspective.
from “Each Day a New Round of Sadness”
Islands of the Hawaiian archipelago are connected
to each other under the surface of the sea.
Under the surface of the sea something roils
like a volcano preparing to explode.
To explode sometimes suggests a solution
to the situation of constraint, ubiquitous
as fear these days, when stasis is a prize.
A prize, that is, compared to illness.
Can’t wellness sink its teeth deep into me
to feel acutely as a wound?
A wound is what the dream delivers
with an image of my mother
wreathed in Hawaiian flowers—
tuberose releasing its cloying
daylong ennui.