Walls

Implicit outlines, the sun on water, or the moon
have always been in this shred of wood. No memory escapes
the seal-shaped lock: a window bored through by insistent waves

My mother is writing a letter in her house. "We're rattling around in here."
From space and space when the transparent curtain blows out

I know her, I remember a naked waist. The fluted windows arc
from inside. Preparation. Cool elbows of a hanger, for or against?

The ceiling lunges over my mother's envelope. My mind cools, pours into
a glass. Integrity. Sound plasters up from the street to press white
paint on walls. Sun cups the water-tower, or is it the moon?

Johanna Jordahl

read the author's Bio and Working Notes

go to For the rest of it, or The Etiquette of Romance

go to this issue's table of contents