Ruth Stone - "Curtains"

Curtains

Putting up new curtains, other windows intrude. As though it is that first winter in Cambridge when you and I had just moved in. Now cold borscht alone in a bare kitchen. What does it mean if I say this years later? Listen, last night I am on a crying jag with my landlord, Mr. Tempesta. I sneaked in two cats. He screams, "No pets! No pets!" I become my Aunt Virginia, proud but weak in the head. I remember Anna Magnani. I throw a few books. I shout. He wipes his eyes and opens his hands. OK OK keep the dirty animals but no nails in the walls. We cry together. I am so nervous, he says. I want to dig you up and say, look, it's like the time, remember, when I ran into our living room naked to get rid of that fire inspector. See what you miss by being dead?


- Ruth Stone

Patty Nash - from "Lübeck"

from Lübeck

The wheel of history is being turned

Terns skim the wetlands which are evaded by the tiller 

The tiller is the lever which turns the wheel

The wheel levers the tiller and is attached to the rudder

The rudder maneuvers the ship like a shark fin

Fine establishment you’ve got here 

Her? Oh, she’s my sister


- Patty Nash