Nocturnes, Op. 9 No. 1

Nocturnes, Op. 9 No. 1

Tara Propper

There is beauty along
the river rot
Chopin's watercolor

ribboning within,
undoing time's finite.
Chopin's watercolor calls

like weeping.
The nailed-in reeds
close like contrition,

martyred mysteries,
everlasting underneath
the earth's heat.

It is the space
where mothers and sons
return to nocturne,

training their eyes
to see beneath
each parable.

---

Tara Propper
Poet & Professor

Tara has earned her MFA in poetry and PhD in English. Her poetry has appeared in The Southampton Review, Long Island Sounds Edited Collection, Literature Today, Taj Mahal International Literary Journal, and is forthcoming in Moveable Type, Occulum, and P – Queue. Her chapbook, Lessons in Nomadism, is under contract with dancing girl press. Her scholarly work has been published in Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy and Composition Forum. She is currently an Assistant Professor of Instruction in the Department of Literature and Languages at the University of Texas at Tyler.

Photography by Andreas Dress