Room 59 • Poetry Hotel
Four Poems / Connie Post
OL’ BLUE EYES
When you took out
that old forty five
of Frank Sinatra’s
“I’ve got you under my skin”
permeating every room
of the house
It was as if
he danced with you
a soft waltz
and dad finally moved
to the back of the line
your hand so light
upon the left shoulder
moving across the room
as if there were no
drunk melody
pummeling you to the
dance floor
the young, perfect Italian voice
could never comprehend
the crimes of a broken husband
the indecent notes of contrition
how he would lead you
off that dance floor
the forty five still spinning
the long scratch in the middle
cleaving the song
like a darkness
you cannot name
-------------------------
BENT SKY
I watched the eclipse
from your gravesite
but I watched it
from the wrong angle
“remember the one
we saw in 1991”
I asked
I told you I missed you,
I told you the baby turned three,
and that
the house hasn’t sold yet
but the grass
wasn’t listening
and I couldn’t think
of anything else to say
so I pulled out
my special glasses
“isn’t it beautiful”
I said
and you nodded yes
from behind the sun
I only looked once
it’s what you would have wanted
the rest of the day
I spent my time
meandering around the yard
pondering the
distortions of a bent sky
thinking about the moon
turning black
-------------------------
STRUCTURALLY SOUND
I hear strange sounds in the night
but you tell me
“its just the sounds that old houses make”
but the ceiling and I know better
this house was built too fast
the concrete was poured too soon
the foundation set wrong
the floorboards are held together
with daily acts of contrition
we know how quickly
walls were erected
how the hands of strong men
forced the frame upward
even while their muscles frayed
we know what it means to hide
know the support beams will fall someday
we know the roof will eventually be condemned
along with the rest of the dwelling
for now
I walk carefully upon
the hardwood floors
listening for frailties
for creaking unnoticed by others
I hide under rickety door frames
find cracks in places nobody knows about
trying to tell you
again
again
how hard it can be
to hide inside a body
-------------------------
FIRE SEASON
Fire is promiscuous
the way it tempts dry grass
lays itself open to a field
one bawdy wind
and the flame is a
dropped dress
passing down the waist of summer
each lie a spark
a way to fan
the infidelity of smoke
undressing a landscape
feeding itself
until the sky is full of
its own sins
we will breathe
and cough
sputter
but the orange
throws us to the known bed of autumn
we will choke
on vows
until the soil below us
erodes and falls away
the arsonist
–now contained
acrid with his own remorse
will drop to his knees
in a field he once loved
and beg for rain
-------------------------
About the Author
Connie Post served as Poet Laureate of Livermore, California (2005 to 2009). Her work has appeared dozens of journals, including Calyx, Aurorean,
Atticus Review, Comstock Review, Cold Mountain Review Slipstream, River Styx, Spoon River Poetry Review, Two Bridges Review, Valparaiso
Poetry Review and Verse Daily. Her Chapbook “And when the Sun Drops” won the Aurorean’s Editor’s choice award in 2013 .She has been short
listed for the Jack Kerouac Poetry Prize, The Muriel Craft Bailey awards (Comstock Review) Lois Cranston Memorial Awards (Calyx), and Gary
Gildner Award (I 70 Review). Her first full length Book Floodwater (Glass Lyre Press 2014) won the Lyrebird Award. Her awards include the 2017
Prick of the Spindle Poetry Competition, the Caesura Award and the 2016 Crab Creek Poetry Award.
Acknowledgements: "Ol Blue Eyes" previously appeared in Italian Americana (Winter 2018); "Bent Sky" previously appeared in the
Lindewood Review (June 2018); "Structurally Sound: previously appeared in Comstock Review (2011); "Fire Season" previously appeared in Marin
Poetry Center Anthology (2008).
