Please consider the following poems, "antiques,"
"tattoo dreams," "saving tomatoes", and "on call" for a future issue of
Woodenfish. I enjoyed the variety in your first
go-round and look forward to reading the next issue.
My name is Jennifer DePrima. In May I earned my
master's from Rivier College in Nashua, NH. Right now I live in Manchester, NH,
where I somehow wound up after earning my undergraduate degree in English at the
now-defunct Notre Dame College (where I met Emily Fitch, one of your current
contributors.). I've had articles published in NH ToDo Magazine and fiction
in InTense magazine.
Again, thank you for considering my work. I look
forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,
Jennifer
DePrima
************
antiques
we make our way past
battered cabinets
overloaded with
teacups – patterns
long discontinued
lovely cream colored
icebox more than
we can afford wire
egg baskets faded
washboards
sky blue
paint scooter green
jackets: military
and books books
books folding trays
bayonet the husband
picks up, slides out
of its sheath smelling
oil that’s good --
someone’s
taken care of it
sets it back on the
shelf walks away
I stand transfixed
imagine: hands with
bronze colored
rings against
a backdrop of
books oiling
this piece affixing
small tag setting
the bayonet on this
shelf for my
husband to
handle
******************
saving tomatoes
vine smell
and earth
fill our
noses as we
pull tomato
plants to save
them from the
coming frost
green globes hang
vines stain fingers
green scent
sticks
pile October
tomatoes
into a basket
set in the
playhouse
to ripen
**********
red storefront
lettered
cold steel on
haight street
tattoo jones
has me in
its vicious grip
long for that
hair prickling
sweatmist
sensation
gloved hand
and metal
rubbing
against me
again
better:
i envision
you –
forearm
flat
eyes closed
lip slightly
parted
hair at your
temples
damp
while i sit
next to you
witnessing
this revision
of skin
hand pressed
against your
thigh eyes
torn between
edge of new
color vibrant
blue and bit
of lower lip
i cannot
kiss
************************
on call
past midnight on
a Friday wrapped in my
uncle’s stolen
army coat (the
two of you
rode the same
bus to Fort Dix)
I sit in the
passenger
seat though this
is forbidden
rumblechug up
the hill powdered
street sliding under
wheels bluegray
sky snowshine
my job is
to prod
conversation:
help you stay
awake long
enough to read
street numbers
find fill-pipe
drag hose over
snow and wait
(ninetieth hour
this week) while
gallons of
oil flow into
someone’s cold
home
frigid digits
you climb
back into
the truck I ask
about the year
you camped
by the
reservoir
you blink
laugh begin
to warm with
loud reply
over classic
rock radio
drive home
through night
worn brittle
as ice