The dog sits on the edge of the bed,
watching what looks to me like silence
after snow, the gleam of yard
muted by clouds.
There’s more to it than that,
of course, but for once my limitations
make me glad. I’m not ready
for the countless things hidden
beneath the dusting of calm
that’s settled onto the woods.
Last year he brought me starfish
from our Christmas tree
and laid them at my feet,
as if I were a goddess meant to weave
her own constellations
or maybe just a mermaid
stranded in a dry land.
Now he brings me nothing
but it doesn’t matter. It’s enough
to be here—safe in the space
between knowing and not knowing.
Beneath the snow field of my skin,
galaxies of cells
are stringing fierce mythologies
through the branches of my body.
What animal can catch its dark constellations
and lay them before me?
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 19, Issue 4.
Lori Lamothe’s third poetry collection, Kirlian Effect, is forthcoming in 2017 from FutureCycle Press. She has also published four chapbooks, including Ouija in Suburbia (dancing girl press) and Diary in Irregular Ink (ELJ Editions). Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in The Journal, Painted Bride Quarterly, Passages North, Redux, Verse Daily and elsewhere.
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