David Sutherland
David Sutherland’s work have appeared in such quality journals as The Hollin’s Critic, The Midwest
Quarterly, The Reader (Oxford University Press), The American Literary Review, APR, The Cortland
Review and others. He has received a Rhysling Award and a Pushcart Nomination. His current collection,
Steel Umbrellas, was published by Archer Books of Santa Rosa, CA.
    D H Sutherland's Poetry

The Mathematics of Love

1 - For every condition p(x) of y and every set
2 - There is a subset {x in Y: p(x)}.

Both proposals finesse the contradiction but are there other inconsistencies in the closet?
Once opened, logicians want a proof of consistency.  But none are found.  If proven, such
consistencies are impossible and the set theory universally fails. Consistency will always be a
matter of faith.  Just a historical footnote except for a long-standing problem;  
You are dreaming Shiva,
ending a world's harvest,
gathering the northern lights in a bundle
to follow Virgil home.
Beyond this moment, these words
this rain. I may never know,
the wind may leave us guessing,
or love may find our proof
within its shadow.




“And love the human form divine, you won't sigh alone.”
                                                    Sigur Ros


Attachment


Immensity is littered with stars but its size owes nothing
to the dazzling lights and worlds within.
As much through its darkness we pass.
Turn simply now through this autumn moon of blue sky,
cinnamon leaf, frost on your breath.

The silence we’ve taken to mean one’s listened.
And if what we remember warrants remembering,
Your footprint along this stream loved,
how wonderful this particular current endeared us
with its rumble. Our ocean lead its passage

to a river that sirens us back to its widening
girth, a body whose stretch lasts only
one breath. One breath now, no how, why, what of this
can be ours.
But should even grander fantasies inspire you?
Then exhale,
there will be one outcome only.





Laundromat Dreams


With the abstract tumble click of a loose coin
The slug of self-service chimes clean.  
And the clothes tattered, faded, bleached out
Hide no waste, no guilt. This merely mind over matter.
Day and night the lace foments into space
And the lavender scent swarms your face.
Never believe its as soiled in the rinse. But
Something is lost in each cycle, lost for what
Existence has dubbed extinct. Goodbye blue jeans
With your numberless joys, your melancholy knees.
Goodbye khaki, trousers, tees whose numberless
Sorrows, numberless holes fill all that is empty
In a whirr whose finish desires powder or assent.





Plastic Hammers


More than likely each tear shed falls outside our room,
out into the corridor whose merging angles confuse
the mind with clutter. The sudden bend of banister
the space between steps, an illusion expiring.

Tonight the sky blooms against your cheek, a willow nods
and a wind in sudden rasps snaps the clothesline in place.
Sweep this aside, and our body's entanglement
is a specter of drapes, its face a skein

of imposition whose lightening discharges in streaks.
Later stars relent, ocean fades and earth fills
this empty place where our voices corner the bed and,
on occasion meet. Slowly we take steps rise

From this illustrious body whose faint remembrance
passes without effect, becomes treason in its balance.