Poetry - Issue 4 | April 2009
Two poems by Jacqueline Dee Parker
Leaving Andalusia
We’ve crossed latticed shadows
of cork and olive trees,
toured bodegas, cathedrals,
pueblos blancos carved in hillsides,
whiffed blossoms sprung
off painted pots hooked on stucco walls
on ribbons of street the width
of a swift’s wingspan—
centuries of ruin and mosaic,
cupolas gilded in apricot light,
basins of holy water, tiles,
stalactites, remains—
Thus, the eve of leaving,
folding maps, shaking sand from socks,
I’m lulled by the children, bent
over squares of paper cloth, hands
rollicking markers, drawing closely—
little girl and boy, just for a little while.
About the author
Jacqueline Dee Parker is a painter and a poet whose flights of fit and fancy have inspired memorable passage to and around many parts of Western and Eastern Europe and Brazil. Her poems appear in many literary journals and anthologies, including Chelsea, Connecticut River Review, Eclipse: A Literary Arts Journal and The Southern Review, among others. Born in New York City and raised in the Northeast, Parker now lives and works in the Deep South where she works as an Instructor of Art at Louisiana State University. Visit her website.