This Is My Matchstick Poem Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

for Hans Christian Andersen and for Osip Mandelstam

this is my matchstick
poem with nothing to
strike on.

a fiery dawn but no
fire.
a thin sweatered winter

in which to aspire.

we are born to burn up:
to live our life's fire.
but it's all green

wood here-
and poetry for hire.

this is my matchstick
poem, I will try again-

in the Age of the charred sun
in hypothermic days
said Mandelstam
through my dream's haze

the matchstick girl, in
the end, saw Heaven
all ablaze

mary angela douglas 15 december 1997; 28 september 2023