Lynne Shapiro | I’ve Read the Room

I’ve Read the Room

 

 

The photo of me in a velvet dress I wore ice skating with my mother at Rockefeller Center when I was small.

 

The little coat in Shindler’s List.

 

The neighbor’s hair (more towards the orange) of which I was jealous.

 

Stella’s 30-year-old, slider turtle “ears.”

 

My favorite pair of readers.

 

One of two loomed Lithuanian bookmarks that grace my writing desk.

 

The two-toned spine of Yi-Fu Tuan’s Passing Strange and Wonderful.

 

The 26 (times two) luminous leaded squares of the Dutch stained-glass doors that lead to our garden.

 

The timid male cardinal (due to his stand-out hue?) and his less timid, subtly colored spouse.

 

Brilliantly backlit, at times, the dot of color that informs us the male downy woodpecker is at the suet.

 

Rooftop peppers that punctuate the winter palette, strewn throughout the garden by squirrels.

 

Kitchen jars filled with smoked and sweet paprika.

 

The ristra I strung from shishitos that changed color at summer’s end.

 

The speckled comb of my mother’s folk art rooster that’s come to our house to stay.

 

 

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Lynne Shapiro has been a writer-in-residence in England, Morocco, and Spain. An arts educator for many years, she worked at the Whitney Museum of American Art and was once an assistant to Susan Sontag. Lynne’s first chapbook, To Set Right, was published by WordTech Editions (October, 2021). Her book, Gala, is forthcoming from Solitude Hill Press (March, 2022). She lives in Hoboken, New Jersey with her husband and elderly turtle. For more information and upcoming events, please visit her website; www.lynneshapiropoet.com

Charles Pierre | The Red Fox

The Red Fox

 

 

At dusk, in the leafless woods,

where the path drops off

to the harbor’s frozen mouth,

silence seizes me.

 

My eyes, scanning the patches

of muted brown and lavender,

catch the only flash of color

amid the diminished acres.

 

A small streak of fire

hunches and watches me,

then skitters off a bit

to hunch and watch again,

 

and I, stiff with cold,

as still as the dormant

life surrounding me,

in winter’s thinnest light,

 

surrender to the heat

of this odd living hearth —

my throat thawed

against the frigid air.

 

 

This poem originally appeared in the author's poetry collection, Father of Water (2008).

 

 

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Charles Pierre was born in New York City in 1945 and raised in Centerport, New York. He studied at the University of Virginia and worked as a copywriter in Manhattan, where he has lived since 1973. Mr. Pierre is the author of five poetry collections: Green Vistas, Father of Water, Brief Intervals of Harmony, Coastal Moments, and Circle of Time.