Never again will I feed the mustangs my mind,
Outstretched in the grey moon of morning.
Ours is a ritual of nevers, the lung’s nocturne
Keeping me awake. In a pang of streetlight
My mother is alive. White elms hurl their forms
Against the glass. In the coldest room
She wraps herself in Moroccan silk.
A draft from the other hemisphere calls back.
They haunt my window, whinny for azalea and cowbane.
Down the dim corridor I find loose hairs
And gather the losses in a bedside drawer.
Elizabeth Metzger is an assistant editor of Parnassus: Poetry in Review and an MFA candidate at Columbia University. Her work recently won the 2013 Narrative Magazine poetry contest.
