Diane Corson, Handmade Accordion Book (opened)
When I was nineteen I began work at my first polar station. I instantly knew that the Arctic was the right place for me.
(Inspired by Evgenia Arbugaeva’s photos and essay “Arctic Dreaming” in National Geographic Magazine Dec. 2020)
In the abandoned weather station
I report the meteorological every
three hours day and night for decades
the radio has formed a rusty rectangle
on the top of the desk the roses
on the wallpaper behind are vibrant
the rest of the wall faded by twilight sun
the ashtray overflows
wooden siding pried from the forsaken
lighthouse serves when firewood dwindles
soviet oil drums become stepping stones
across sand and snow has blown out
the windows of the forsaken school
has covered the piano and desks with hoar
my wife forsook me for the south
of Siberia but I believe we can reconcile
if she returns to the dashed circle
the desolation of the planet’s roof
the solitude that is our foundation
in my dream I see a watermelon
pink through rind splitting ahead of the knife
but I wake and it is still black cold
with no trees to block my imagination
the whole peninsula becomes a sea vessel
I’m in the rowboat ocean and sky both
smolder mint green in the dark that lasts all day
and the end of my cigarette is
the only bright thing out on the night
sea a hot smoldering marigold a bright thing
every day is not the same, look: today
aurora tomorrow a net of ice
I wouldn’t do well in warm weather
___________________
Mary Giudice