Kersten Christianson
The Port au Port Peninsula
This far shore measures
the cadence of old French and Basque languages,
the first notes of a fiddle removed from a battered case;
the old songs and stories of fine catch and shipwrecks
around crackling bonfire;
perhaps even the laughter of a little girl
who disappeared into the rock,
into the sea.
We gather fossilized rocks
imprinted with the signatures of trilobites.
There is wave-battered wood broken from lobster pots,
knotted rope, and broken shells
to haul home for winter beading projects.
This far shore keeps the beat of my heart.
Where Celsius and Fahrenheit Meet
In the outdoor
cold of a frozen street,
dark and empty,
40 below sounds
hollow.
Snow crystals coat the fur
of red fox chasing a red fox
through wind-shifting drifts -
fox trails.
Scampering shadows cast
by streetlight, dim aurora,
and sliver of moon
fade to
gray smoke lifting
from chimneys, our hair
frozen silver, a white thread
of the Yukon.
Kersten Christianson is a raven-watching, moon-gazing, high school English-teaching Alaskan. She earned her MFA in Creative Writing/Poetry through the Low-Residency Program at the University of Alaska Anchorage in 2016. Her recent work has appeared in Cirque, Tidal Echoes, Fredericksburg Literary & Art Review, Inklette, On the Rusk, We’Moon, Sheila-Na-Gig and Pure Slush. Kersten co-edits the quarterly journal Alaska Women Speak. When not exploring the summer lands and dark winter of the Yukon Territory, she lives in Sitka, Alaska with her husband and photographer Bruce Christianson, and daughter Rie.
The Port au Port Peninsula
This far shore measures
the cadence of old French and Basque languages,
the first notes of a fiddle removed from a battered case;
the old songs and stories of fine catch and shipwrecks
around crackling bonfire;
perhaps even the laughter of a little girl
who disappeared into the rock,
into the sea.
We gather fossilized rocks
imprinted with the signatures of trilobites.
There is wave-battered wood broken from lobster pots,
knotted rope, and broken shells
to haul home for winter beading projects.
This far shore keeps the beat of my heart.
Where Celsius and Fahrenheit Meet
In the outdoor
cold of a frozen street,
dark and empty,
40 below sounds
hollow.
Snow crystals coat the fur
of red fox chasing a red fox
through wind-shifting drifts -
fox trails.
Scampering shadows cast
by streetlight, dim aurora,
and sliver of moon
fade to
gray smoke lifting
from chimneys, our hair
frozen silver, a white thread
of the Yukon.
Kersten Christianson is a raven-watching, moon-gazing, high school English-teaching Alaskan. She earned her MFA in Creative Writing/Poetry through the Low-Residency Program at the University of Alaska Anchorage in 2016. Her recent work has appeared in Cirque, Tidal Echoes, Fredericksburg Literary & Art Review, Inklette, On the Rusk, We’Moon, Sheila-Na-Gig and Pure Slush. Kersten co-edits the quarterly journal Alaska Women Speak. When not exploring the summer lands and dark winter of the Yukon Territory, she lives in Sitka, Alaska with her husband and photographer Bruce Christianson, and daughter Rie.