Friday, July 8, 2011

TWO PIECES BY MARY ALICE ENDICOTT

Miracle for a Painting

plums have been falling
all summer
ripening under the
remaining heft of
unfettered branches

never tasted
now sweetly rotten

lumped like toads

storms bring that
sinking premature dark
on the drive home

flies stir like gossip
wait for me

and hover close
to the ground

the buzz fills my shoes

the sky redone

a wide
sun warms me in
an instant
and I see

her painted face in a contour of rainwater
gathered at the rut



The Model

I would like to have you sit in those
cupped jean shorts          fitfully smiling
as a wandering eye brushes
your knee and winks closer
you talk about being seventeen

if I knew you then     your hair
still tawny but maybe 
not pulled back

would we still be friends

somehow you're dancing wild circles
crushing the empty bell of my heart
thumbing where your favorite
ex-husband's ring still itches
sometimes when you are
making love to the new boyfriend

but here you are without
him         his name
a whispered amen in the usual beginning

you raise your steepled back
tall in the sky of my night
offer me penance
of your mouth     curve
pulsing with laughter

taut in your smile       I am bowed
as helianthus in the night hours

how I want you       how the hope that
stirs me to touch
aches through my hands



About Mary Alice Endicott:
Mary Alice Endicott is a student living in Elizabethtown, Kentucky. Originally from North Carolina, she plays the mandolin & sings in the ECTC choristers while not studying, painting, writing, or trying to find a job.

No comments:

Post a Comment