I am pleased to present this selection of poems by Flora Field for Tupelo Quarterly. Flora—as both character and speaker—is caught between the light of seeing just how “exquisite” and “durable” and “ceaseless” the horses are and the “muck where light cannot be reached.” Flora’s poetry calls to mind John Berryman’s Dream Songs in the singularity of its voice (recalling childhood), the richness of its allusions, and the depth of feeling conveyed through its lines. Her poems are brought to the fore by a speaker who is concurrently “fragile” and “little” and strong and brave enough to find that “it was enough” “to let go of the desire to be understood.” I am enthralled by Flora’s journey “to hear the wood hit the ground,” “sway[ing] on the back of large horses,” in a world filled with fear and cruelty. In her cries and solitude, she creates a center point to ground her pain as the “dry grass crunched and waved and arched beneath their hooves.”
Flora Field is a poet from Oregon. She received her MFA from Columbia University where she was a Teaching Fellow. Her writing can be found in The Vassar Review, Thimble Lit Mag, The Adirondack Review, and elsewhere.