Chapman Hood Frazier

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Opacity of Water

   In a dying time
my mind
fins out to sea
past the breakers 

as a pelican’s shadow 
flickers
across the surface
waves break
  as I panic 
struggling 
to surface

to call  though
no one 
hears

I rise again 
swallowing
water
salt
sinking
in an urge
for air

needles    of light
deepening
like   diamonds

a fountain sprays to the sky’s
blue
as she
grasps  my hand
a swirling        dance

heart
drumming
coming

I
black          below   breathing 
water

eyes     blurring 
  the light 

Chapman Hood Frazier’s The Lost Books of the Bestiary was published in 2023. His work has appeared in The Virginia Quarterly Review, The Southern Poetry Review, The South Carolina Review and other publications. Several poems have won awards from the Poetry Society of Virginia and his “Conversations with Contemporary Poets” interviews with poets from the US and Northern Ireland have appeared in The Writer’s Chronicles, Agni Online and Shenandoah. Currently a Professor Emeritus from James Madison University, he lives in Rice, Virginia and co-manages Bellfield Farm LLC, a writer’s retreat.