Poetry by Chrissy Schreiber in the style of Rebecca Wolff:
I’m Embarrassed
I can agonize for days
I could cry a whole river
not who I am
not who I am
not who I am
(a broken record / I keep coming back)
a cassette tape
tangled and dirty
pulled and twisted by grubby little fingers
the porcelain understands
knows my needs, empathizes
gets that I need a cold pillow
fingers holding my hair back
a blanket around my shoulders
when I start to shiver
small tokens
of love
in a low moment
and they’ll say: no big deal it was funny you were funny
not who I am
not who I am
start a gratitude journal
Ohio
This place is nothing but cold.
It seeps into my bones like it did on that frigid winter day in Ohio. My
Nose is numb, my toes are numb. I can’t feel my fingers. I always hated
Ohio.
It’s the same reason I hate them all – South Dakota, Wisconsin, Maine – especially Maine
beautiful but harsh
geese belie goose pimples from head to toe
disguised
paralysis.
Computers
Everyone walks around
with their
zeros and
their ones
stapled to
their hands like the nails on a
crucifix
hex codes
designed to
catch the eye and
keep it
locked up in a box
made of glass
and metal
what would you do with four hours
and two minutes
and thirty seconds
you could write twenty-four thousand
words, or solve
sixty math problems. The word
compute
was once a human term –
like calculator or spinster –
all intelligence
is artificial.
Poetry by Jacquie Burckley in the style of Jean Toomer:
Tail Eater
Buckled scales pillow my fingers,
Sweat skims the ridge lines,
Coiling around to start again, like
A purifying glyph – tail eater.
Ivory teeth refracts
Oyster sun
Crimson moon
A dovetail moon swallows
Tail following buckled scales.
Wrens
Perched in a chilly corner and
Coveted by no one he sits;
He watches the riverbank,
Stagnant all these years,
Glitter slightly as the sun
Lathers its body,
Waiting for strike time.
Finally he tenses his buff-tipped
Wings and climbs skywards,
Passing the seasoned leaves,
Drenched in confetti brush,
Smothered in fleeting cloud,
Consumed by the solstice,
Toward a new, idle coastland.
Milk Boy
I pace the room wondering when anything, anything
Will go my way. Silver hooks hold up the brewing ring
And bronzer links bottom-suspend the goblets like bats
On an especially hungry night – a silent type of fat.
Broad and lengthy horse hairs dipped in thin wax
Stick to the floorboards, always resting on my stacks
Of three-week-old milk crates that I keep just in case
He comes back to see me. For now I pace.
(Read) Between the Vines 