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INTELLIGIBLE
HUES:
LAWYERS & POETRY
SUSAN ABRAHAM
_____________________
Miniatures
I.
When a man can't sleep, he builds
a matchstick replica of Auschwitz
in his basement, working from memory.
II.
A child's china tea set has service
for six small mouths. Sitting cross-legged
on the floor, the girls pretend to sip from empty cups.
III.
From the airplane, the farm is a square;
the hearse is a box filled with people
whose tears are too tiny even to glisten.
IV.
The space on a bird's face
between the two eyes and the beak
is just large enough to be pierced by a slender arrow.
V.
The women dreamed that when he left
he took the floor beneath her with him.
It was a short dream, just a little thing.
[277]
Quick, Before the Wind
Ask the sand crabs for an inch by inch
description of my hips:
they've been scaling the depression I left
in the sand for hours. Quick,
before the wind fills in the parallel canyons,
note the lengths of my legs
that never stretched into willowy limbs,
but knew when to stand and when to lie down.
My thin wrists barely left
a trace; my ankles attract the interest
of sea gulls. Of the feet,
all you see are deep heels-a shame
you could not meet the toes.
But this is just a trace of the back of me:
had you come in time, we could have met face to face.
Susan Abraham was born in 1955, received a B.A. in English from Oberlin
College in 1977, a law degree from Rutgers University in 1983 and an MFA
in poetry from the Warren Wilson Program for Writers in 1990. Her poetry
has appeared in Paris Review, Poetry, Denver Quarterly
and Tikkun. She worked as a criminal defense lawyer for over fifteen
years, graded bar exams, and represented plaintiffs in employment discrimination
cases. Abraham now teaches at New York Law School.
Susan Abraham: "Minatures" and "Quick, Before the Wind" were previously
published in Paris Review (1992). |
