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Dzvinia Orlowsky
Peter Schwartz
Annabelle Moseley
David Trame
Marcus Cafagña
Lyn Lifshin
John Grey
Mankh
Sam Hamill
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Emily
with her delicate
fingers and calves,
her bag that
says "Books, Cats,
Life is good," a
teenager I thought,
certainly not over
20. Emily with
no mistakes,
even in ballet, dark
eyes is, I learn
weeks after, pressed
for more, more
by a dance teacher
till she collapses,
spasm of pain,
a child cardiologist
and surgeon, not
would be ballerina
though she is good
enough. But her
fingers dancing thru
blood, intricate
beats in a gown in-
stead of tutu, per-
forming delicate
combinations on a
tiny heart beat,
so it can leap
as she can.
Waiting for the Death
its sent e-mail
is on its way
video tapes, CD's.
Who knows where death is?
In a lily opening, in
the palest cherry leaves?
Is it hiding out
behind the heart or
the liver? Is it
pink as a mouth
or nipple? Heart muscles
become flooded,
floppy. Is this
where the soul, slippery,
the lovers you can't
pin down, is
soaking up
what it can in the
stillness, somehow
planning for a
long trip?
Lyn Lifshin's recent books are Another Woman Who Looks Like Me from Black Sparrow at David Godine and The Licorice Daughter: My Year With Ruffian from Texas Review Press. She has published over 120 books and chapboooks and edited four anthologies of women's writing including Tangled Vines: A Collection of Mother and Daughter Poems, in print 20 years. Her website is http://www.lynlifshin.com.
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