Nicole Gervace and four poems
Nicole Gervace appears in Issue 21 with four poems preserved in full. Their language is spare and narrative, repeatedly setting violence against flowers, rivers, moss, spruce, orchids, horses, family relations, and small domestic scenes. An independent contributor archive for Ascent Aspirations also records Gervace as a poet, preserving the title “In the Dark.”
The south social
She explained,
The men were calling
on the girl
thinking, talking
with a compound eye
on the girl
and compound interest
on the girl.
All around he is
a son of a bitch
who speaks
Apologize, he said.
He had a knife
We are what the
seas have made us
One was going
to stab the other
the other shot the one.
What cause have you
Rose words
You Killed him.
The Country Violets
He spoke a few words
to her lover
with the eye on the leaf
and there is a fight
that breaks out
at the party
between neighbors.
She met him there
next to the window
He grabs a rifle and she sees
where the moss grows
on the spruce.
He fires three times
All the parts spine into spine
the horse knocks him down
The other man comes over
gets his pistol, shoots him and
they both die of their wounds.
Near the Mississippi
They live in a small
shanty by the river
with dogtooth violets
were they must prop the door
for it to close.
While he slept
the one man decides
he can’t take the other.
No work, and the grass
he shoots him through the heart.
He didn’t mean anything
and moves cautiously
over the wild heads of the flowers.
Family Matters
He couldn’t read but made
his mother-in-law read
the letters to him
close his heart
they were nasty
to another man
granite to sand.
He was going to her
with whiskey and a rifle
he made her come home
after wild orchids
and he shot her in the gut.
His daughter saw
the whole thing
where the flowers
are the loveliest
but had to lie and
say mommy did it
to herself.
Literary record
The surviving Issue 21 page preserves all four poems. The Ascent Aspirations contributor archive separately lists Nicole Gervace under poetry with the work “In the Dark.” No broader biographical identification is asserted here because current same-name records do not establish a reliable literary match.