Elizabeth Robinson is the author of several collections of poetry, most recently Rumor (Free Verse Editions/ Parlor Press) and Blue Heron (Mountain West Series). Her book, On Ghosts (Solid Objects) was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Award. With Jennifer Phelps, she co-edited the critical anthology Quo Anima: Innovation and Spirituality in Contemporary Women’s Poetry (University of Akron Press). A new collection of poetry, Vulnerability Index, is forthcoming from Ahsahta Press later in 2019.
Susanne Dyckman’s most recent collection of poetry is A Dark Ordinary (Furniture Press Books). She is also the author of equilibrium’s form (Shearsman Books) and three chapbooks, Counterweight, Transiting Indigo, and Source. An additional chapbook, Hearing Loss, is forthcoming from above/ground press. She has co-edited both Five Fingers Review and Instance Press, and for a number of years hosted the Evelyn Avenue reading series.
Man in Doorway
The pose of a ringed hand on the head
protects against a blow. Or against inclement
weather. Or the hat in hand shields
a pair of eyes from the world: I am not
seeing and am not seen. Or I am grateful
for a doorway, for shoes and socks when everything
turns to dusk. Cloth slowly reclaims itself as thread,
dirt resting on a trouser cuff has traveled far
to find that rest, a bed where one must make it.
This is what lives, curled fingers of down luck,
the stretch to starry night, warm wind.