Martha Silano
Disillusionment of 6:22 AM
The banisters are tragic like engines
who jump their tracks. The curtains
a mangled blue Audi on the Blue Line
Train. Of colors, I can say blue, can also
say green, say yellow, say black. What’s
a landscape made of? DO NOT ENTER,
a parking strip, a wooden bench. None
of this was ever strange, except in his
mind; he never spoke of it, especially
not at work. Walked and walked,
a notebook in the pocket of his suit.
His wife was his muse, every periwinkle
for Elsie, their life an embroidered
credenza. Baboons strode in and out
of his dreams. Baboons and haunted
nightgowns. In his poems, blood
an abstraction, a concept, not
spurting out after the shrapnel.
Here and there, a tiger; here and there,
a drunk, a sailor asleep in his boots.
Martha Silano is the author of four books of poetry, including The Little Office of the Immaculate Conception andReckless Lovely (both from Saturnalia Books). She also co-edited, with Kelli Russell Agodon, The Daily Poet: Day-By-Day Prompts For Your Writing Practice (Two Sylvias Press 2013). Her poems have appeared in Poetry, Paris Review, American Poetry Review, Orion, and The Best American Poetry 2009, among others. Martha edits Crab Creek Review and teaches at Bellevue College. Find her online at marthasilano.net.
Return to March 2016Edition
The banisters are tragic like engines
who jump their tracks. The curtains
a mangled blue Audi on the Blue Line
Train. Of colors, I can say blue, can also
say green, say yellow, say black. What’s
a landscape made of? DO NOT ENTER,
a parking strip, a wooden bench. None
of this was ever strange, except in his
mind; he never spoke of it, especially
not at work. Walked and walked,
a notebook in the pocket of his suit.
His wife was his muse, every periwinkle
for Elsie, their life an embroidered
credenza. Baboons strode in and out
of his dreams. Baboons and haunted
nightgowns. In his poems, blood
an abstraction, a concept, not
spurting out after the shrapnel.
Here and there, a tiger; here and there,
a drunk, a sailor asleep in his boots.
Martha Silano is the author of four books of poetry, including The Little Office of the Immaculate Conception andReckless Lovely (both from Saturnalia Books). She also co-edited, with Kelli Russell Agodon, The Daily Poet: Day-By-Day Prompts For Your Writing Practice (Two Sylvias Press 2013). Her poems have appeared in Poetry, Paris Review, American Poetry Review, Orion, and The Best American Poetry 2009, among others. Martha edits Crab Creek Review and teaches at Bellevue College. Find her online at marthasilano.net.
Return to March 2016Edition