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We are a public forum committed to collective reasoning and the imagination of a more just world. Join today to help us keep the discussion of ideas free and open to everyone, and enjoy member benefits like our quarterly books.
Picture it pleasant: breeze like the first
Tang of strawberry, snapped weed like green beans.
Semigloss latex of waxy
Flower; bluegrass to snip
And play two blades. Cattle grates over
Dusty roads, access covers in sidewalks, a tic-tac-tac of heels,
Cups, kettles, tinny radios and cookware
In the corner’s lazy Susan.
The half-percent milk: the calculus of Ingrid.
Nails getting long scratch many splatters;
Clipped, quit tickling at the keyboard. Peasant, an orange gone
Squishy with age, a brunch they’re going on. Department stores,
Many things, too many: clutter keeps her occupied.
Feature greeting cards, circumlocutions
For pangs lacking language; when writing absolute
Addresses, it pays to be painfully precise,
Only he can’t spell her name and she can’t his.
The bluster of trumpets only fixes
A broken bracelet with a safety pin.
Michelle J. Boese lives in Moscow, Idaho.
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