The Beast Speaks
David Stringer

You are in a foreign country
 smells of garlic, sweat, goats,
perfumes like rotting pears. Almond
eyes take your measure. Guttural
babble, diphthongs, liquids,
the rise of pitches and eyebrows,
all too fast. Brown hands tug
at your coat
             when clear as sunlight
you hear her voice reach out from
the polyglot tangle to sing
you the cool cadences, familiar
surprises, the green music of your own
language, to pull you stunned, happy, home.

ISBN 1-882983-10-6
31 pages/$6