Poetry

Lisa Olsson

During Meditation #19

I need a new story for my husband. I’ve made him into someone who is weak, predictable, practical and not very good looking.

Water runs until it gets hot. I wish I could save it.

Walk back into the room. Retrieve a forgotten idea.

Minerals brought up, polished, on the sill, stratifications and imperfections articulated in the light.

I used to believe hard, sing hard, want hard.

Rain brought acorns down last night. They hit asphalt, shingles, cars, ripped through dried leaves.

I missed him more than he missed me.
The trainer says that every time the dog eats what’s left on the kitchen counter, it’s my fault.

Deja Vu never happens anymore.

The bay comes up higher and higher, rinses me cleaner and cleaner.

Brenda  gave me her apartment keys, and a photo of a cabinet in her bedroom where the folder is. She has no family left.

My earliest memories are of hiding everything from my parents so they could never know me.

I don’t know which is more alluring, the eccentric or the mundane.

Seaside Bungalow

We find ourselves
on honeymoon
 
in Corfu. We believe 
we’ll change
 
each other in time—never
now. We watch olive
 
leaf shadow drift
across bright whitewash.
 
At our hideaway we 
sit and sip,
 
stare beyond 
cliff, sea fig edge,

littered shore —
erasure far and blue.