Some Things Left Largely Ignored
End of winter rain falls harder here.
It’s as predictable as an old clock
ticking somewhere in the house.
Snow disappears overnight— soggy
ground moves in all directions under
my feet— without thinking, I
navigate a walk’s short distance.
There are three voice messages
left on my phone.
………….I tilt my chin to look up
at the luminous sky, longing for words
that transcend these solitary hours.
Mid-sentence
In early morning hours, I find myself lingering
over a half-nibbled round of toast, a steaming
cup of Irish tea, my sleek pen left mid-sentence
on an open page. . . .
I’m tired of mild exchanges; I’d rather put
a bold face on this day that’s looming ahead—
clouds of steam rising in the orchard— sun
burning through the sky’s stretched linen, like
phantom hunger, wanting more than what
appears to cross its path— my soft padded
prowl for what’s not yet strewn— waiting
for the impulse that makes me turn my head.
M. J. Iuppa lives on a small farm near the shores of Lake Ontario. Her most recent poems have appeared in Poetry East, The Chariton Review, Tar River Poetry, Blueline, The Prose Poem Project, and The Centrifugal Eye, among other publications. Her most recent poetry chapbook is As the Crow Flies (Foothills Publishing, 2008), and her second full-length collection is Within Reach (Cherry Grove Collections, 2010). Between Worlds, a prose chapbook, was published by Foothills Publishing in May 2013. She is Writer-in-Residence and Director of the Visual and Performing Arts Minor program at St. John Fisher College in Rochester, New York.
