after your anger, no door will open.
your anger, the door slammed
on me, on us. i recount your
leaving to myself, how you ripped your soul
away from mine while talking love--
abandoned me to ardent dreams
of your return. now my mind
is forbidden these dreams, but my body
doesn’t know. in sleep,
it takes you back, fully, wholly
without question. others tell me
of my moan-filled nights, how my hands
stroke my thighs as they tighten around you.
foolish body! i’m imprisoned here still, in this body
that loves you. in this house
whose door you slammed on me, on us.
was it because you couldn’t take
the loss that, months later, you made up
the story of my betrayal, then spat it out at me
as truth? your anger, a door slammed
on me, on us. may i remember the crush
of that door swinging wild-hinged
even as i walk around imprisoned
in my love for you, even,
even as i forgive.
Harbor
sometimes i can't help it
i'm down and i want to stay down
but then you hug me, your ample
breasts snug under my smaller
ones like an art sculpture
of a puzzle piece, and i feel
my spirits lift against my will
damn happiness i think, it's just
her breasts, they have nothing
to do with how things will turn
out between us, and i try not
to be pulled out of the treacherous
moment, out of the safety of
nothing can get worse than it
already is, but there i am, helpless,
elevated by your breasts
Over eighty poems of Ann Tweedy’s poems have been published in journals and anthologies, including Gertrude, Rattle, Damselfly Press, and Clackamas Literary Review, and she has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Her chapbook Beleaguered Oases is forthcoming from TcCreative Press in Los Angeles. Originally from Massachusetts, she currently divides her time between Skagit County, Washington and San Diego.
