goose music is
louder in
blackness. Reeds
shudder and
the trees creak
Something without
a shape claws
the unseen. Gnawed
branches the
beavers went for
hold nests in the
crotch of gone
leaves. The
iced willows
bend over the
ground like a
woman with long
hair weeping
all morning I've gone
over your name. It
wasn't the plan. Some
thing, Irish music
yesterday, the down
so long blues, a sliver
in the air. Your face
still in an upstate
drawer, your body
becoming roses not
that many metro
stops away. Your
voice, the lure, the
hook still on tape in
that grey bedroom
where everything else
slid from my hands
still, the images,
that kaleidoscope
of blue—blue
sweater and eyes
only the blind
could resist.
Sapphire, blue
iris, a bice
blue, a cobalt
indelible. The
feel of cold
glass on skin
waiting for you
to show. In your
sheets, I left
rose and Chloe.
In mine, new
sheets, wine
coolers for dawn
as the real world
slid from me
like a sheer
night gown
Lyn Lifshin's Another Woman Who Looks Like Me was published by Black Sparrow in 2006 and selected for the 2007 Paterson Award for Literary Excellence. Other recent books include Barbaro: Beyond Brokenness (Texas Review Press, 2008), Persephone (Red Hen, 2008) and 92 Rapple Drive (Coatalism Press, 2008). Her book Nutley Pond is forthcoming from Goose River Press, and Light at the End, the Jesus Poems is forthcoming from Hazmat Press. Her poems have appeared in most literary and poetry magazines and she is the subject of a film, Lyn Lifshin: Not Made of Glass, from Women Make Movies. Her web site is www.lynlifshin.com.