Poetry

I RECOUNT MYSELF ON THIS

By Sarah Felder

Eyes back, lean back, I haven’t felt

The bare boned winter yet,

 

Your face in circles trailing skin-like

Apparitions, parenthetical laugh lines,

Twined lips, puckered and alive with

Hiccupped laughing;

 

The Italian leather of your BMW sticks

To my thighs, I dream of her there,

The yellowing walls of the Ramada,

Where we smoked cigarettes all night

Between scratchy throws and music

Humming against the floors.

 

Back on the Island I remember you more:

The broken stairs to Mconoky beach,

Lambert’s cove road winds to me, extends

It’s tar limbs to visit for a day, and since leaving

That whistle of a place I no longer

Feel the salt under my fingernails.

 

We take tattoo guns and permanently mark this on ourselves:

This feeling of springtime at eighteen years old,

Slap youth on the back because you were

Never

A child

Just a reflection of the person that

Would take off to East Hollywood

Forever

And fall asleep with the other junkies and drag queens.

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 About the Author

sarah felder profile picMy name is Sarah Felder; I am from Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts. I am finishing up my degree here at APU this spring. I am inspired by nature, nostalgia, and the passing of time. I love contemporary poetry, but read all genres from all times and places. Some of my favorite poets include, Elizabeth Bishop, Ezra Pound, Stephen Dobyns, and Sharon Olds.

One Comment

  • Kellyn M.

    While reading this piece I was struck with a strange sense of Alaskan winters and old Hollywood. I loved your word choice in “parenthetical laugh line” and “twined lips.” I thought that these were interesting and fresh ways to describe facial features that both depicted specific imagery and character. Your attention to all the senses (sight, touch, smell) create a very strong experience for the reader. I felt like I was inside of this piece of writing. Your ending left me with complex and painful feelings for the character, both knowing what he/she has gone through in my own experience and yearning to know more about the motives behind both characters.

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