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Catherine Gilley Poem
You marrow-deep in the bone-dry field,
sprawled like a wishbone snapped wrong-
the ground drinks your weight,
but won't swallow you whole.
wind combs its fingers through the wheat,
a mother's touch turned phantom.
That house- small as a postage stamp,
licked, sealed, and sent too far-
waits with its back turned.
your arms are bridges to nowhere,
your legs, two broken clock hands,
stuck in a time that does not move.
still, your gaze- sharp as a knife-edge moon-
slices the dance like a butcher's twine.
the land here is a tight-lipped secret,
a locked jaw of yellowed grass,
a lungful of dust that never exhales.
you wear silence like a second skin,
but your eyes, keen as a needle bite,
thread the gap between longing and gravity.
eagle-eyed girl, you have the hunters staring,
but the hunted bones
tell me- does the sky ever blink first?
Copyright © Catherine Gilley | Year Posted 2025
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Catherine Gilley Poem
They stitch their whispers into my skin,
tight seams of blame, unraveling me.
I wear their questions like a second body,
heavy with the shape of accusation.
What were you wearing? (A name I did not choose.)
where were you standing? (On the fault line of his wants.)
why didn't you run? (My ribs were a locked door,
and fear turned the key in my throat.)
Their eyes, sharp as needles, thread me through-
patchwork girl, quilted in doubt.
My silence is a crime, my voice an
inconvenience.
I flinch beneath the weight of their words.
They tell me I carry ghosts in my mouth,
that my story is a wound best left unopened.
But I am tired of swallowing knifes
and pretending I am not bleeding.
So I let the truth spill ink on white sheets,
staining everything they wanted to keep clean.
Copyright © Catherine Gilley | Year Posted 2025
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Catherine Gilley Poem
Upon the pond, where lilies float,
Two ducks did meet, each fine of coat.
Their feathers gleamed ‘neath gilded light,
And thus began their feath’ry fight.
Quoth Drake to Dame, with pufféd chest,
“Good wench, thy quacking lacks finesse!
Thy tones do clatter, coarse and crude,
Like pebbles cast in solitude.”
The Dame, unruffled, gave a grin,
“Thy jests, dear Drake, art weak and thin.
Thy waddle doth betray thy girth,
A gluttony unfit for mirth.”
“Ha!” cried the Drake, his beak askew,
“’Tis rich from one so fond of stew!
Dost thou not sup on weeds and muck,
Whilst I, with grace, pluck finest duck?”
The Dame did scoff, her feathers flared,
“Thy boasts are naught but hot air bared.
Pray, speak not of thy ‘noble feed,’
For bread thou seek’st, in beggar’s need!”
“Zounds!” quoth the Drake, “Thy tongue’s a blade,
Yet mine shall strike a sharper raid.
Thy nest, I’ve heard, is poorly made—
A wretched heap in moss decayed.”
The Dame, unbowed, gave sly retort,
“My nest, though humble, holds the fort.
Whilst thou dost prance and preen with pride,
I guard my eggs where love doth bide.”
At this, the Drake was caught amiss,
And stammered, “Nay, I meant not this!
Thy quacking’s fine, thy waddle grand,
The fairest duck in all the land!”
The Dame did laugh, her eyes alight,
“Thy tongue turns soft beneath my might.
But peace, dear Drake, let’s end this spat—
For ‘tis but folly, duckish chat.”
And so they swam, the quarrel done,
Beneath the amber-setting sun.
Two ducks, their wit as sharp as steel,
Proving jesting hearts can also heal.
Copyright © Catherine Gilley | Year Posted 2024
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Catherine Gilley Poem
They handed me the scalpel like a crown-
Queenship of the pail and prostrate.
I ascended my throne of sterile steel,
The body laid bare, my unwilling courtier.
Death they said was merely a textbook.
I nodded, pencil poised, as though it were true.
The first incision felt too intimate,
A betrayal of secrets not mine to expose.
The nurse called her "Donner" as though she were a beneficiary of grim philanthropy.
I prefer to call her Margret, or Jane.
I learned quickly: the heart is plump, the lungs bellows, and the brain tangled power grid.
But these metaphors grew thin,
An overused blanket full of moth-bitten truths.
what they didn't teach was that DEATH was an artist.
Death paints in shades of beige and bruise,
His brushstrokes subtle, almost apologetic.
"Here" he murmurs, "Is the poetry of ending"
And leaves you to recite in your own time.
I recite with my gloves on,
A litany of Latin and cold detachment.
I begin to see him, everywhere.
In the brittle frailty of bones under fluorescents,
In the hallow echoes of a stethoscope.
He lingered like the smell of formaldehyde,
Clinging to my clothes, my thoughts, my sleep.
I dreamed once of her- Margret, or Jane.
She sat up, stitched together.
Smiling as though death were nothing more than an inconvenience, like missing the bus.
"you'll get use to him," she said
As though we were discussing a tiresome colleague.
And maybe I am.
I've started leaving my scalpel in my locker,
As though it too might learn ambivalence.
I wonder if this is what they meant by "clinical"
To see death as a coworker
Instead of a tyrant - or worse, a friend.
But Margret, or Jane, never tells me
Whether she minds my hesitation.
her silence is my syllabus,
Her body my bittersweet credential.
Copyright © Catherine Gilley | Year Posted 2024
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Catherine Gilley Poem
I sit where they sat before me,
knees folded like pressed flowers,
hands stitched together by someone else's
threads.
The air is thick with the ghosts of breath,
the weight of names I do not know,
the hush of mouths shaping syllables like
fog on the glass.
I open mine too.
The sound comes but it's not mine.
It floats up to the ceiling
and gets caught in the rafters like dust.
No one notices.
The wine is warm and bitter,
the bread turns to chalk on my tongue.
I swallow anyway.
I think I could slip through the cracks in the
floor.
I think I could curl into the lining of the hymnals,
thin and fading at the edges,
wedged between stories I was told to
believe.
I see my body from above-
white dress, an empty cup, a marionette
waiting for a string
Someone pulls, and I nod.
Someone pulls, and I kneel.
The bells ring, and I do not move
The choir swells, but I do not sing.
The doors open, and I do not leave.
Instead, I let go,
a thread unraveling in the pew,
a name whispered under breath,
a shape dissolving into light.
Copyright © Catherine Gilley | Year Posted 2025
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