three poems

by Adele Hally

Motherless Girls Are Always Cold

The cats are multiplying

in the crawlspace, the earthy place

under your feet. Their sunless nest

a seething mass of teeth,

fur, and fishhook claw.

The feral realm wails—they fight,

they hiss, and yowl. But you love them for it.

Through the floor they tell you, how the hot

pulse of their blood and marrow still holds

the old world—the pitch and roll of the ships

salt on pink tongues, wild with night.

They had arrived, rat-fat and royal,

to abandon the relics—those rusted anchors

meant nothing to them here. Feathers fall

at your feet; sorrow, like smoke, spreads,

tender as a fresh bruise.

Forever, you will envy them,

their silken brutality.

The way they survive.

For The Last Time

This is the season of walking backwards, retracing,

following the tideline—the fat slick of jellyfish left behind,

their bodies still shimmering and pearlescent, searing in the sun.

A solo heron's slow-motion rise, as unconcerned as an afterthought.

Behind wire, the blush-cheeked parrot whistles the same tune

over and over, the flawless mimicry of a musical echo

a human sound that feels like vertigo. And so,

I slide back into the valley, remembering, returning.

Mother is still here; the air she no longer breathes

is syrupy sweet. The moon stencils the grass through the trees

branches are weighted with ripe fruit.  Heavy in my open hands

the sleek-skinned orange hums and purrs with a memory of the sun,

or something else. Vibrating, the peel splits from within

a swarm of bees, plumes from the open wound.

Mother is nowhere now—a flame burst of stings streaks like lightning.

The pain frets, barren and fruitless; it is always this way,

as sweetness buds back to bitterness.

The Clock Winder

This year, the jasmine blooms too early; the sweet

smell is a trapdoor—twisted crowns of winding vine

threading tendrils through our hair, a scatter of tiny petals

strews my face like freckles. Abandoned cicadas’

desiccated exoskeletons cling to the trees; they crackle

in the heat, waiting forever to be reunited, complete.

A wedding veil of dew-encrusted cobwebs. On my

ring finger, a ladybug settles like a promise.

We are so quiet now. Foot-flattened night grass traces

its patterns—the knotted labyrinth of absence.

A mourning veil of mist and moth dust. My chipped

tooth, mirror shards and a bad penny.

I was born here again and again, always forgetting.

Always crying about the wrong thing.

Photo of Adele Hally

BIO: Adele Hally is an Australian writer. She is studying part-time for a BA in creative writing at Curtin University. Her work has appeared in Cagibi, Folklore Review, The Marrow Poetry, 2024 Grieve anthology, and elsewhere. https://www.instagram.com/adele.hally/