Rebecca Givens Rolland
After Visiting Hours
Steep the bandage, hasten the evening off.
Who speaks of loss is arrogant: haul him off.
This castle’s got twelve doors, eleven open.
If the triptych shifts just once, you peel it off.
Lawless, I loved a dart-riddled man. First
name on his lips, he scrambled: I hurried off.
If love’s a green creation, I’ll cast it forward,
waking for one sweet minute, nodding off.
Is this the place: bold cousins, bare manger?
I gulped the soup you gave me, hot lid off.
Promises, parks, winters make me nervous.
Caught in snowfall pattern, I wrote it off.
Holidays: stripped, stark light, then sugar.
Feeding mice, you fled, never tipped me off.
I’ve got a gold familiar watch, just maybe.
Its ticking makes me take my jacket off.
Will you profess, half-dead, before leaving
these olive groves, flecked kites taking off?
One child folds an airplane, blue origami.
Wings achieve strict beauty, raveled off.
In the final round, is eloquence denied you?
Has your mouth torn, bleak memory cut off?
Details remain blurry: we just know patience
shattered. Glass chessmen wrestled us off.
You’re the one they warned me of last evening.
Hearing shots, I panicked: you told me off.
Refused, I won’t deny you till dire questions
force me to confess. Betrayed, I stagger off.
I’m your witness till seawater takes me over.
My name’s forgotten, last vowels hastened off.
Rebecca Givens Rolland recently I won the 2011 Dana Award for Short Fiction. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in the Kenyon Review, Witness, Cincinnati Review, Colorado Review, FIELD, and Denver Quarterly. Her first book won the 2011 May Sarton New Hampshire First Book Poetry Contest and was published by Bauhan Publishing. Currently she lives in Boston and is a doctoral student in education at Harvard.
Return to May 2013 Edition
Steep the bandage, hasten the evening off.
Who speaks of loss is arrogant: haul him off.
This castle’s got twelve doors, eleven open.
If the triptych shifts just once, you peel it off.
Lawless, I loved a dart-riddled man. First
name on his lips, he scrambled: I hurried off.
If love’s a green creation, I’ll cast it forward,
waking for one sweet minute, nodding off.
Is this the place: bold cousins, bare manger?
I gulped the soup you gave me, hot lid off.
Promises, parks, winters make me nervous.
Caught in snowfall pattern, I wrote it off.
Holidays: stripped, stark light, then sugar.
Feeding mice, you fled, never tipped me off.
I’ve got a gold familiar watch, just maybe.
Its ticking makes me take my jacket off.
Will you profess, half-dead, before leaving
these olive groves, flecked kites taking off?
One child folds an airplane, blue origami.
Wings achieve strict beauty, raveled off.
In the final round, is eloquence denied you?
Has your mouth torn, bleak memory cut off?
Details remain blurry: we just know patience
shattered. Glass chessmen wrestled us off.
You’re the one they warned me of last evening.
Hearing shots, I panicked: you told me off.
Refused, I won’t deny you till dire questions
force me to confess. Betrayed, I stagger off.
I’m your witness till seawater takes me over.
My name’s forgotten, last vowels hastened off.
Rebecca Givens Rolland recently I won the 2011 Dana Award for Short Fiction. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in the Kenyon Review, Witness, Cincinnati Review, Colorado Review, FIELD, and Denver Quarterly. Her first book won the 2011 May Sarton New Hampshire First Book Poetry Contest and was published by Bauhan Publishing. Currently she lives in Boston and is a doctoral student in education at Harvard.
Return to May 2013 Edition