JENNIFER ABBOTT
Three Poems
Husbands and Wives
We stared at a desert in a rented movie
where two old people scanned a landscape
that seemed uneasy due to its distance
and the insanity of the sun.
That night I was young, and cool,
so no sweat should have trickled
to my mouth, but I tasted it anyway:
part of a wave of a sea
much farther than my hand could reach
unless I stood and walked away.
Last Kiss
Within weeks, the memory of it replaced
the one of the first time our lips ever touched,
before the grooves we wore into each other
erased paths we might have taken.
Our cool, pre-coffee glances,
too brief to allow warmth to surface,
were part of a routine whose diversions
couldn't quite keep us from wondering.
I remember it sounded like a bulb burning out,
a snapshot, a quickness I'd never have predicted.
Even now, I don't understand how it happened,
though I know every move I made to get there.
Gina,
I have heard some describe you
as European actress, couture's dream figure,
dimpled muse. And there are other choices,
but their heavy syllables work the palate
too hard--unlike the sigh of you gliding
into the field of vision, the way you cause
the throat, or that place behind the eyes,
to soften with a glorious "ah";
the arch of your eyebrow
a hint at some unconcern for your drink,
or at the likelihood you will tiptoe
to an ear and spill everything;
the seam of your stockings
anachronistic as all real perfection.
You ignore boring conversations in ways
I wish I did: by slipping through the bars,
by scrutinizing canapés you know
you taste better than, by swaying unsecretly
at parties where the only music is you.
You make me crave myself
and the belief in my own power to mesmerize
that I turn the spotlight away from now
just to see it more clearly.
Jennifer Abbott has an MFA in poetry from the University of Arkansas. She currently lives in New Orleans, where she edits law review articles for Tulane. Her poems have been published in GoodFoot and Melee.
author retains all rights
© 2009