Fabrice Poussin teaches French and English at Shorter University. Author of novels and poetry, his work has appeared in Kestrel, Symposium, The Chimes, and many other magazines. His photography has been published in The Front Porch Review, the San Pedro River Review as well as other publications.  

City Stage

She craves the innocent and their young dreams
laden memories made along many a wrong turn
her tentacles lay in waiting to feed an insatiable hunger.

Dark in the thick of summer days
damp when the air refuses to quench her thirst
no star ventures to corrupt its light with her appetite.

There is that abyss in the center of an eerie trap
deep into the unfathomable entrails of the kingdom
glass upon concrete into a stranger tomb.

Man-made peaks lost in the midst of a black mist
their teeth shine as they devour the evening feast
a large grin frozen in the gaping hole of eternity. 

All disappear as they feed the merciless beast
their fears and their pains oozing to the surface
like a fiery inferno they return to humble beginnings.

Then again a flash falls, such an obscure curtain
upon the stage where they may have once loved
a void for the next hopeful performers to dare an entrance.  

The monk and the anchoress

They watched in terrified awe as kin walked on
bowing before the idols of a maddened century. 

She contemplated the loss of a father
shedding a tear at the recollection of his kind soul. 

He attempted to refrain from the passion of hate
as monsters multiplied with stealthy speed. 

They smiled as they shared the comforting thought
at least they felt close in the wish for a distant exile. 

He, a monk, she, the anchoress, apart perhaps
yet inseparable by their common urge. 

They would run to the mountain tops
leaving behind the terror trail others follow.

Abandoned to a pure destiny with nothing
left to fear of man, free and away from a billion daggers. 

Touching the wall of the temple

Dressed in a winter coat of skin and fiber
I brush against the walls of a room cold as ice
there will be no embracing the angels this night.

Breaths of unseen souls come to invade the realm
bright light through the common blueish aura blind
burning to the core of the unfinished masterpiece.

Taking a step perhaps to fall into oblivion
an abyss echoing of multitude lost in the depths
will respond in tales of what could never be.

A steel gate closes thick as the fiery door of damnation
to shake the foundation of what I once attempted to build
the ramparts remain sterile as the fragile virgin snows.

Dressed in in a winter coat made for the cruelest climes
I shiver as if naked, to the intimacy of those faint bones
there will be no embracing the angels tis night.