Anne Barngrover’s poems have appeared in such journals as Indiana Review, Witness, and Smartish Pace, among others. Her chapbook Candy in Our Brains, co-written with Avni Vyas, will be forthcoming from CutBank Press in winter 2014. She is currently a PhD candidate in Poetry at University of Missouri.---------
Science of Uncertainty
As the season browns
like an apple I watch
the spider lace her web
paler than smokein my porch corner.
Against the inside-outside world she waits
for what catchesin light. They come
to her and stay—thistle, fly, mosquito,
cottonwood seed,
black thread, hangnail,
littlest measuringspoon, a knot
of golden hair.Against the wool-heat
of the season I waitfor the man who kept
on the lantern who left small stars
on my collarboneand traced my hips
with his tongue.When he asked where
I learned to kissthat way, how could I say
it was to keepanother man from leaving?
Each flick was a cry of desperation,
each cry a measureclung to rancid air.
How could I say
that he left anyway,
found another girland married her?
I learned nothingis sweet enough to keep
from casting aside.
The Waiting Girl Sobers Up in the Same Room as Before
Another one with your spell in my blood.
Another one with you leaving. After the flood.
After the song. Another one with dry wine
at my table. Your dark smell lingers, heavy
as walls. A pear rots in the carpet. Moths fuzz
the chandelier. After the red tide.
After the chorus line. A doorknob chunks
inside my skull. My nails stiffen with clay.
After the conjuring. After the over-
share. Another one with everyone in khakis
squinting through the windows, murmuring
why are you so alone? Another one
where I like that. Sunset flushes seeded glass,
pink as citrus. After the hangover. After
the nicotine stains. Another one where
I show too much thigh. What else could I do
but clear my throat of smoke, tap my wrists
with oil, and arrange my face
like a plate of odd salads? All night, the long shadows.
Another one where the ceiling caves in.
Another one with rain in my hair.