Issue 12, October 1997
Amy Wright - Poem

i.
     
I really should allow myself more space, she thinks,
scribbling another haiku.  Uncross my legs, unpocket
my hands, breathe deeply.  It's the fault of those
Crosswords, their symmetry.  
     
Running her finger around the rim of a heavy Pfaltzsraff
plate, Janine recalls breaking things, un/doing.  Her mandolin,
a witness, splintered in a pink shoebox on her closet shelf.
     
   ::
     
Her wig is matted, tucked between her panties 
and rose-scented soaps.  She places her head in the kitchen sink,
squints as the water rolls down her forehead.  Maybe 
I'll be a shampoo girl, she says, her voice hollow against
the stainless steel.  After work, lay my neck in the basin's collar 
bone.
     
   ::
     
Mornings always take a little too long.  With teeth brushed,
she eyes the newspaper, waiting impatiently.  8:37.
Three minutes allotted to walk to the Bridge Street train.
    
   ::
     
In the plexiglass
she mouths her best words: 
street light, subway, ivory.
     
     
     
ii.
     
Kenny Jamison puts on his shoes
one shoe at a time.
Sock, shoe.
Sock, shoe,
leaving one foot bare
while he ties the laces.
     
This trait is newly acquired.
Months ago he would have
stepped gingerly on rain drops.
     
I have overcome 
my table of contents, he says
to no one in particular.
     
     
iii.
     
Nora collects
broken safety rings.
     
She claims synthesis as their appeal.
But really, it is their resemblance
to the smooth shells of locusts
that allow them to pile up in her drawer.