Cicada Song: poems by Marzelle Robertson. Number 25 in our Rane Arroyo Series.

[ cover image: Annie Spratt, courtesy of Unsplash ]

Publication:  October 21, 2025 [100 copies]
29 pages
ISBN 978-1-960693-31-0
$ 12.00

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Marzelle Robertson is a former teacher and school counselor from Northeast Texas. She has published poems in numerous journals and in three previous chapbooks: Listen (Dancing Girl Press), Toward the Terminal (Kelsay Books), and This Good Trail (Kelsay Books).

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No Blinds

The undivided panes in the new windows
make them seem bigger than the old ones,
make the sunset more intense as the reds
and violets splash over them, and the dark,
when it comes, enters unimpeded.
Dare we turn on the lights? We must wait
twenty-four hours for the caulk to dry
before we rehang the blinds. We have supper
by candlelight, undress modestly in the closet
and slip surreptitiously into our blankets.
It’s the first night of the snow moon.
As if there are no windows at all,
the close, full moon washes into the bedroom,
illumines it with ethereal light
as reflective as snow on a wide field.
It’s like sleeping outdoors, but different.
Outdoors we settle into the landscape.
Indoors we feel exposed, worry
that the neighbors will see us,
judge us in our humanity—
until we don’t, until we become aware
of nothing except the light’s purity
and what is natural feels natural.

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