Caroline Goodwin: California Poets Part 10, Three Poems

Caroline Goodwin

April 2nd, 2026

California Poets: Part X

Caroline Goodwin

Three Poems

SITKA DOCK LIGHT

"If the Creator listened to poets, He would create a flying turtle that would carry off into

the blue the great safeguards of earth." —Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of

Space

If you were to find me, change your mind,

change the petals of the wheel, the poppy's

veins opening the day, its murmuring serrations,

its leaves the tiny feathers just touching my wrist,

touching the central, swollen base of my pistil

and if you were to turn away, your song become

plaintive, a question or a quill and if then the terrible

morning turned to wool and the Earth softened

and we were able to march straight into the wound

together, straight back through skylight into star,

into that emptiness knocking at the ovary, bad

luck which was my heartbeat, what would He

create? Not my blue voice, my blank slate.

OLEUM WHARF WEST LIGHTS

"Wolves in shells are crueler than stray ones." —Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space

If you were to unfold the daybreak, list every

reason for the wickerwork, for blackfly wing,

for wandering among the shards to discover me,

beginning tree, seedling in the soil a sparkle,

wet mouth in the undergrowth, my teeth bright

ice in the dead wood, my throat a thin tube,

lichen-like and growing a layer of green breath,

a phospho-lipid, a bright lens or that microscopic

music of the branching Earth, if I were to reach

into the space between us, were to crackle

and my fingertips arrive, those laughing

whorls, those miniature notes, would you

understand? Would you march it all back?

FOREMOST LOCK DAYBEACON

This, then, is my ancestral forest. And all the rest is fiction. —Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space

If you were to remember that alchemical

spill, another winter afternoon, something

like the tide arriving, silver and unapologetic,

blue steam rising from a bowl, voice of the Father,

voice of the forest or the crop field frozen, far-

away sun in your hair and remember the girl,

dog at her heels, devil at her heart knocking

steadily along every waterway and remember

there was no escape there was never an escape

from an era bent back, from that furry cobweb

and claw lodged in the lung, rooted in the wall,

that pawprint, that moment multiplied and locking in,

would you see me? See my mark, my lit face?

Author Bio:

Caroline Goodwin moved to the Bay Area from Sitka, Alaska in 1999 to attend Stanford as a Wallace Stegner Fellow in poetry. Her most recent collections are Old Snow, White Sun (JackLeg Press, 2021), Madrigals (Big Yes Press, 2021) and Matanuska (Aquifer Press, Wales, UK, 2022). She lives on the San Mateo Coast and teaches creative writing at California College of the Arts, Stanford Continuing Studies, and UC Berkeley Extension. From 2014-16 she served as the first Poet Laureate of San Mateo County.

www.carolinegoodw.com