Transit of Venus

This is my mother -
born six feet tall,
grew to five foot two.
She wants to be a dancer
like Margot Fonteyn,
but she is pregnant
with my sister.
She leans against
a maroon Ford Sedan,
feathery garments
loose, belly atop
waddling swan legs.

I am not here yet
to lie in the rear
car window and watch
street lights slash across the dark,
or smoke candy cigarettes,
or corral fireflies in mayonnaise jars,
or catch cooties
from my fifth grade crush,
or lose my roller skate key
in the rusty underworld of the thorn
bush near the window well,
or see my mother�s mind
become a pas de deux.

Polar Body

Our argument turns into the Iditarod, leaves
us exasperated and bone-tired.  Words cut
angry fissures on the surface; a waste of sea divides us.

Outside, a winter storm rasps its last breath.   You hunt
me out through the ice in my breathing holes �
the cosmic dive of Arcturus.  Your hands become roots
that break through frozen earth in spring thaw.

                                                                                                © Lori Romero

Loch Raven Review Winter 2005 — Vol. I, No. 2
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