Narrative One: The Story for Me

pull and slip before caution

last time we taunted field trains

I bruise you then

the pull

how I breathed freedom

and you

square red hipster

then sauntering

designed

towards you fire

lip caught and teeth caught

carbon smoke of wanting

fire

then not

my story: thirteen damaged lilacs

: prayed rewriting

: fallen and looked away

fallen

designed then  not

last and queen and focus

sauntered telling — revival of thought

our lipless ashes

memorize and left for faltered

broken story

shattered hip bones

Narrative Two: Pillow Book

my list of comfortable disclosure:

(written small written careful)

lust envies your trickle toes

the pulling in of stitches

pull out

rebraiding

lost this time

this telling

near and knotted

then ripping:

precise design

woven breath and spice my shelter

frozen you are

I / or

my scent of you

silent and covered sound

parched tongue

have built you

and whispered devour

parched surrender

Beautiful shadow I wear you copper

my adorn

adoring

Narrative Three: Together Performance

we are old together

not years but length-wise

in our secrets and smooth remembers

I have talked you from shed recapture

your staged self

half detailed

you my carriage canopy

not smoke filled, ours is rigor conversation

the stretched reliance

smothered, shiftless metaphor:

we do not desire you

but words instead as survival

do I mock your performance

an act itself: revision

smooth lines, though

crease of face paint

over eyebrows

you unrecognized

recovered

watch me and learn you

I will do the same

know myself your vision

word carried

letter sparse

different places, you and I

but never true afraid

my face still uncovered

                                         — for G.

EVE ROSENBAUM is a graduate of the MFA Creative Writing program at American University. She has published poetry and prose in journals including Potomac Review, Affair of the Mind, Caprice and Artemis, and in the anthology "Yentl's Revenge: The Next Wave of Jewish Feminism" (Seal Press, 2001).  An essay is forthcoming in the anthology "Joining the Sisterhood" (SUNY Press, 2002).  She is currently the proofreader for Daughters of the American Revolution.

You can email Eve Rosenbaum at: everosenbaum@hotmail.com

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