Category: Poetry

It would be, I told
my mother, better though clueless
is, as smart people say, the only
truth in cancer. 

                                   Within the world
opposite us, smart people were leaving
Baghdad, war plans prepared.

A port appeared
beneath her clavicle, fluid in tubes
though eyes turned to a top general
fingering before smart people a vial meant
to worry nations. 

… ...continue reading

Because to appreciate
the natural world is to lament its swift decline
over the last
hundred years or so, on miraculous water
I not only walk,
but also stand still.

What am I saying?
Rain is still until it falls, I tell myself, as if
pressing a depreciated
leaf—mint or maple—branched off from an expired,
but not tired,
plant or tree—between two fingers, mine,
or my other hand’s.

Rain is
still until I listen
to it drinking from the roots of the tender young shoots,
but not tendrils,
of an elongated plant, or a minute tree, testing,
but not tasting,
the dead air, and falling and falling through it,
and adding,

all around me, nothing
new. Now I fathom all I can rely on when I rely on
the slow, so
slow, almost time-lapsed, natural world.… ...continue reading

“What do we do now?” my mother asks,
sitting where my grandmother used to sit
at the kitchen table. Her siblings have joined her,
their four chairs cardinal points on a newly restored
compass. They think we, the six grandchildren,
can’t hear them now that they have sent us
to the living room to play Clue and watch the Red Sox.
But their voices are approaching thunder
to our listening hearts, which are soft and unripened
even though we have lost before and our ages range
from sixteen to thirty. … ...continue reading

He’s ours the whole night through
and there’s no shaking this problem.
(We’ll do better with the next one.)

My crooked nose on that misshapen skull,
you started brewing on that second date
when I went home alone
hating your father for all I hadn’t done.
I swore to my mother I would never have you—
not you, of course, I didn’t know you then—
but some you I couldn’t oblige, squeezed
out of this swollen, bleeding bluff
that could not imagine swallowing pain for anyone but herself.

And I still can’t—sometimes I don’t know if I chose you or if I allowed you,
if I wanted you or if I accepted you.
But what’s the difference, when I choose you now?
You’re here, my Wednesday prince.… ...continue reading

R32 is hurting again.
Without looking at me,
a dentist I didn’t know
told me R32 moved onto a nerve
& I’ll hurt to the touch for a few days.

I couldn’t stop rubbing
the side of my jaw
& I asked my mother
if this is how it felt
when her lover broke hers.

I asked to paint her X-rays
to see if I could mend
her jaw with my strokes
& colors. I promised her
I wouldn’t paint her teeth
in black & white.

But my mother told me to balance
gravity in the back of my mouth,
the pressure will make R32 fall
into my throat, leaving
my nerve alone,
but I was too afraid  
to swallow
my teeth.

– Annie Cigic

Author’s Note: My poetry often focuses on themes of motherhood, the body, unconventional relationships, and adoption.… ...continue reading

You have to know what they look like first:
houses spared a tornado,
trees listening to the prayer of finches,
the deaf beggar clapping for the opera of snow.

Then you wait for it in your most elegant dress and shoes,
sitting in the most beautiful chair you own,
the one with the flowers,
in order that you may greet the miracle
like a bride.

Of course, you’ll begin to wonder what the miracle will be–
will those who have died send their regards,
for example,
through a fallen bird feather,
will your best friend’s cancer go away,
will the homeless dine with fine china and gold spoons?… ...continue reading

for Artie                                                                                  

The plane to Charlotte is late                                                  
and the gate won’t open
for air. Lights pass in the sky,
and one must be the twinkle
in your eye. Travelers hold
little mirrors in their hands, without
reflection, unaware the massive
amount of breathing in this place,
all of us existing in a box
until the mask on a mouth
can’t save us, and more than a plane
goes down. Without notice.
Without time to reach for the hand
in the next seat over. I’m stuck
at this gate between here and there,
just waiting, counting breaths,
while you so quietly moved on.

– Beth Williams

Author’s Note: This poem started when I received a phone call that a friend had died. I was waiting at the gate for my plane and wasn’t able to embrace my emotions at the time.… ...continue reading