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Skin has turned from ivory quilts
to tissue dregs lathered over bone.
I can feel your exit build--
a thunderhead and symphony
that rumbles in a room of glass.
Talking is a wincing game.
It's always been that bug
afraid of swatter flats, messy grief,
whatever stains the dressy cloth,
lifts the sealed mask.
When you arrive for holidays,
I fan the napkins perfectly,
become a stranger to my heart,
always pouring fix-it juice--
ironing the bunched despair
so wrinkles do not calcify
and tattered seams remain
agendas for a poem.
Aren't you even curious
what stews below the politesse?
Our truths are such a taboo waltz.
I worry I will die complaining
veins were mostly rivers and streams
for liquor and anger mixed.
Life is such a thin chemise
beside the flaming torch.
I hate the thought of stoning grief
with boulders of regret for words
I left unsaid and dangling.
The last tango is here.
Soon enough we'll have no feet.
Janet Buck is a six-time Pushcart nominee. Her poetry has appeared in numerous publications, including Octavo, The Pittsburgh Quarterly, CrossConnect, Poetry Magazine.com, The Montserrat Review, Offcourse, HiNgE Online, MiPo, Poetrybay, and Facets Magazine. Tickets to a Closing Play, her second print collection of poetry, won the 2002 Gival Press Poetry Award and is now available at www.amazon.com, www.barnesandnoble.com, www.booksurge.com, and www.givalpress.com.
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