Maine in Summer
The Art of Napping
The gull-crying coast of Maine Smelling of kelp and wild thyme You picking your way toward me through rocks at the shore. Was anyone ever so blond? Sea winds had tousled and gilded you I longed to touch the long muscle on the top of your arm Closed my eyes wrapped you round with love kept you warm on star-chilled nights Let you go When the water went gray When the city Washed in with the tide.
Something about curling up on my right side in fetal pose on taut bedcovers closing off the afternoon and its world is like stealing silk and not getting caught. —Lori Esmond Calderon
—Phoebe Wray
I Am Still Consider Old Women Consider the vulnerability of old women: soft folds of flesh around their necks, wide waists, variegated moles and age spots prominent after years of shifting flesh. Horrified to see my mother’s thighs loosen, her posture shrink as her bones betrayed her, I averted my eyes and hoped for a firmer future. Judi Dench, aged, enters the screen in Notes on a Scandal, feet awry, skirt just over her knees, hair permed and lifted for youthfulness. We know she is in trouble, yet she lowers herself into a tub of hot water, hair off her face, over bite adding to her beauty; sloping shoulders, melting neck, bare skin: we are nervous. How much flesh will the camera expose? My Aunt Mamie Lois feared rape in her old age, having read of young men breaking into homes and raping old women in her city of Birmingham, so she put bars on her windows and wrapped a scarf around her aging neck.
Feet curled beneath me Early morning light filters past Bright like crystal Through the windows I hear only the sounds of the old refrigerator Listening to the high hum The low whir I lose myself between them —Alyse Dietrich
Peril One leaned over to the other and exclaimed, “I tried dating for a while, but it was so depressing, I just became celibate—it was easier—it’s a control thing.” She said this as she stabbed a poached egg with her fork, and then carefully sliced a medallion of pork with her slender fingers, as straight as the knife she was holding. —Christopher Porpora
—Cecele Allen Kraus
track 7 the scene stealer swallowed tuesday, 10 am. as the novocaine subsided, the night bled into folly and hubris. the celestials snickered sovereign as she crawled inside the cube. jingle jangle! the caterwaul between the black frames demanded the violets unfurl. the glare curled in orbit around the halogen anatomy. interpolate, you miraculous bitch! the dancers memorexed their strokes as unhemmed laughter cascaded down the walls like stickum. hallowed be thy head! the mortar dried black in her ringlets with a shiver. i simply must know why you looked back. —Sharon Nichols
7/07 CHRONOGRAM.COM POETRY 63