Third Shift

by Elizabeth Pope

painting by the author

 

 

You took a night class, 3D design with the intent to get out of the house
to meet people and make something, to move your mind off the ceiling
watermarks baring the maps of escape, fissures leaking
the silhouette of Alaska.
                                                Left your husband
                                                and daughter, bottled breastmilk in the deep freeze.

Your hair was longer then, and you always worried it might catch fire
as you solder-ironed a book out of steel strips
the size of toothpicks, slipped and missed the spine, grew
a blister the professor said to dunk in water
that swelled into a soft pebble.

You walked away from the books latched
            in cannons of libraries and felt missing.

You read of the Expressionists, their lover still-lifes: Woman I, Woman II, Woman V
when you’d come home covered in charcoal, in soot, your body becoming a miner
as you nursed; your body becoming lost
in earth. You studied the violent splashes
of de Kooning on canvas: Conception of Woman, Woman of negative
space seeing herself stitched by light
in reflection of bottle, in dark matter of leaf punched together
as bouquet, as memorial. Woman of contradictions standing as storm
pictured in funhouse mirrors. Woman of obsession, Woman of home—
            landscape dismembered,
sunk in sun and cirrus. Woman of sentiment spoken in light, her ribcage thought to
death.
Woman of broken locks and dye, splintered
stroked light scraping her ceilings.
                                                And you could see the giant
                                                vignettes of the awakened as they were told
                                                floating lighting and raincloud
                                                    within the glint of wall and glass.

 

You felt alone and veteran in that class. On your way home strolling the pond-edge
mallards drowned the female in heat, sisters on the bankside
watching, waddling away, running.
            You threw rocks at them, knocked a couple under, until they sprouted
and spewed paint like water.

You thought to tell someone about it, how it bothered you to see
something hurt, to hurt for something.

You tried to when you walked through
the door, but someone was always leaving.
So, you rocked and sketched the edges—bindings and parchment in your sleep. 
                                                The book would open with metal hinges
                                                and everyone would see through the iron
                                                gate of lilies.
                                                No.
                                                Of waterfall and teeth.

 

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Elizabeth Pope holds an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Bluegrass Writers Studio. Currently, she is pursuing an M.A. in Anthropology at the University of Louisville and a doctorate with interests in Comparative Literary and Cultural Studies. Her honors include an Emerging Artist Award from the Kentucky Arts Council and an Artist Enrichment Grant from the Kentucky Foundation for Women. Her poetry appears in The Louisville Review, North Dakota Quarterly, Euphony Journal, Red Rock Review, Appalachian Heritage, The Fourth River, Still: The Journal, So to Speak: a feminist journal of language and art, New Madrid, and elsewhere.