Smokes

Susan Wheeler

Winner of The Four Way Books Award Series in Poetry
selected by Robert Hass

HE OR SHE THAT’S GOT THE LIMB
THAT HOLDS ME OUT ON IT

The girls are drifting in their ponytails
and their pig iron boat. So much for Sunday.
The dodo birds are making a racket
to beat the band. You could have come too.

The girls wave and throw their garters
from their pig iron boat. Why is this charming?
Where they were nailed on their knees
the garters all rip. You were expected.

The youngest sees a Fury in a Sentra
in a cloud. This is her intimation and she balks.
The boat begins rocking from the scourge
of the sunset. The youngest starts the song