Donal Mahoney - Three Poems

Death, A Bear

Odd the way the very old
pick a winter day to fall,
break a minor bone,
be assigned to bed,
and death, a bear
napping out the winter,
rises in his lair
instantly aware
here is Spring
and ultimately honey.



Husk of a Horsefly

It's the last day of September
as I carefully toe
the husk
of a horsefly
out of my office
onto bright tiles
Stella will buff
to a sheen
while I am at home
surveying my supper.
But now I have time
to sit at my desk
till it's time for my train.
I can lean back in my chair
and listen to the day
drone near the ceiling.
Soon it will
helicopter down
like a horsefly,
touch ground
and taxi awhile
before braking.



Blood and Spittle

These drawings
he fingers on paper now
in blood and spittle
are the curls
of a little girl
he stole from Van Gogh
whose sister
he fathers now
on paper
without any sperm.



Donal Mahoney, a native of Chicago, lives in St. Louis, MO. He has worked as an editor for The Chicago Sun-Times, Loyola University Press and Washington University in St. Louis. He has had poems published in or accepted by The Wisconsin Review, The Kansas Quarterly, The South Carolina Review, The Beloit Poetry Journal, Commonweal, Public Republic (Bulgaria), Revival (Ireland), The Istanbul Literary Review (Turkey), Carcinogenic Poetry, Opium 2.0, Rusty Truck, Pirene's Fountain (Australia) and other publications.