You retell your stories, the tale
of your first car, a Rambler
you primed and sanded, then put in
its thermostat upside down.
The young people quietly look at
their phones. You slip the wrong
filter into your furnace and save
the old one dark with mold.
You give away photographs, releasing
your beautiful mother, her caustic
sister, yourself with a dollhouse and
little tin soldiers. The photos take you
back eighty years, your mother
alive in the next room, you asleep
in the little bed. You drive to a market
where carts jolt a cold cabinet
containing a rose that leans
in its clear plastic vase. And here
is a sunset that looks like a circus tent
bursting with orange balloons.
Photo by Mark Hillringhouse
Barbara Daniels’ book Rose Fever was published by WordTech Press. Talk to the Lioness is forthcoming from Casa de Cinco Hermanas Press. Daniels’ poetry has appeared in Prairie Schooner, Mid-American Review, and other journals. She received three fellowships from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts.
