Landscape with Houses

by Kristen Havens

—after Landscape with Houses by Wassily Kandinsky 

This was my village,
the little church
the red-roofed houses
and the stray cats
along the river banks
trees casting shadows
of shifting beings
onto the grass and sky.

This was my home,
eyes everywhere.

This was my life,
the fire sky
dark wood and
muddy bottom
and the man at the edge
looking back
at me, dodging
his own reflection.

Kristen Havens' poetry and fiction is forthcoming or has appeared in Phantom Drift, PANK, concis, The Fourth River, and Slipstream, among others. She lives and writes in Los Angeles, where she works as a freelance nonfiction book editor and copywriter. Find her on Instagram.