thru the shade. He’s been
playing since midnight
Jenny standing in the
door, parting the
curtains slowly
wind chines
Jenny’s slightly sour
sheets
the few white hairs on
I’m sorry I couldn’t
forget
and swing, but my eyes
were burning
lying now, this mattress
in your old friends’ house
lemon sun, Billy’s
we should have thought,
I could have been
sketching you all
this time
you tell me my
breasts are glistening,
take off the lilac
shirt and I lay there
hardly noticing mosquitos,
the wool
If I say lie could I
lose this blue, could
I feel more like I
did then
thinking damp thoughts
the Chianti in an
old clay jar,
your cool shoulders
Lyn Lifshin’s recent prizewinning book, Before It’s Light, was published winter 1999-2000 by Black Sparrow press, following their publication of Cold Comfort in 1997. Another Woman Who Looks Like Me will be published by Black Sparrow-David Godine in September 2004. Her poems have appeared in most literary and poetry magazines and she is the subject of an award winning documentary film, Lyn Lifshin: Not Made of Glass available from Women Make Movies. She is working on a collection of poems about the famous, short lived beautiful race horse, Ruffian. For more information, her web site is www.lynlifshin.com.