Cider Press Review, Volume 17, Issue 3 is now online. Enjoy new poems by M. Ross Henry, Carmen Germain, Catherine Moore, Erin Rodoni, Sarina Bosco, Diana Smith Bolton, SarahJordan Stout, Christina Seymour, Jan Bottiglieri, Sara Henning, Allison Joseph, Corrie Williams Kentner, Anthony Botti, Kathleen Brewin Lewis, Doug Ramspeck, Elise Gregory, Julia Bouwsma, Knud Sorensen (Translated by Michael Goldman), Jess Williard, Adam Penna, Jennifer Stewart Miller, Katie Manning, Eloisa Amezcua, Givhan Jennifer, Ann E. Michael, Simon Perchik, Sara Biggs Chaney, Jacqueline Balderrama, Alessandra Bava, Tina Richardson, and Alina Stefanescu. Reviews of Spencer Reece, Laura Madeline Wiseman, and Anne Marie Macari by David Seter, Corrinne Adams, and Cindy Snow.
Tag Archives: Alina Stefanescu
Listen to Me, Maria Calciu!
by Alina Stefanescu
I didn’t believe you about the bird: not the eyes you said were made from leaves.
Nor did I believe in longing that tasted of soil: the implication that you placed dirt on your tongue and swallowed a morsel of holy communion.
I never believed in transubstantiation: why would I believe you turned back into the earth consumed?
I didn’t believe much. I didn’t believe it’s partner, not much, either.
But I believed the memory gate you saw stretched across the empty fire of August: that and the way you held your own hand, one hand-lover to another, afraid the fire might die and take the gate with it.
I didn’t believe you could be so careless, playing with the fire stoked by summer’s last breath.
But I believed you about the flame and how much better to burn alive than end unwilling: a cluster of cremated ashes.
How fire licks the heart like a long-lost kitten: coming home.
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 17, Issue 3.
Alina Stefanescu was born in Romania, raised in Alabama, and reared by the love-ghost of Tom Waits and Hannah Arendt. She lives in Tuscaloosa with her partner and and three children who don’t believe she was a finalist in the Black Warrior Review’s annual poetry contest this year. More online at http://alina_stefanescu.typepad.com/writing/.
See all items about Alina Stefanescu