S. T. Brant

Before Consciousness
(Tranströmer I)

Waking up is going down: a negative parade::

Foul nightmare: soaks the exhibitioner
of surrealist epitaphs::

The air through the graveyard: through the busiest
sentences of town::

Drowns them

Below trees ::

The pit is not as isolating if not dark.

Individual
(Tranströmer V)

This is fateless: where is my acceptance?::

Defenseless heart: desiccated by abandon-::

Annihilating anti-sensing infinity:
does death intersect with recognition?::

Spontaneous nature: devaluation of human time::

Packaging ephemerality: death, my home::
equated resonances::: greatness in the flawed::::

Loneliness to share with vacancy: here, beguiled::

Left shadows: unexpecting attachment::
consolidate into::: darkening meridian::::

Homely solitude: writing, lonely, stranded::

Eternity’s Unraveling
(Tranströmer VI)

Fate: precipitation :: before: correspondent birth ::

Dead are: substantial :: as: the living ::

Feel unwelcome: unalone :: grave is common: living place ::

Breath: little merit :: assigning more: dead, living ::

Day’s roles: true, sightlessness :: day provokes: be, affection ::

Dead’s to living: entrepreneurial :: bear tragedy: a remedy ::

S. T. Brant is a Las Vegas high school teacher. His debut collection Melody in Exile will be out in 2022. His work has appeared in numerous journals including Honest Ulsterman, EcoTheo, Timber, and Rain Taxi. You can reach him on his website at ShaneBrant.com, Twitter: @terriblebinth, or Instagram: @shanelemagne.