by Lisa Zaran
~for robert john
I love to drive, he said,
as he came crawling toward me
across a desert floor, burrs in both of his knees,
a dead star caught in his long, gray hair.
I feel used, he said,
and old as usual.
I believe I'm at the height of my existence.
At once exhausted, he lays himself at my feet.
I begin combing the nests out of his hair,
scraping the dirt away from beneath his fingernails.
Kissing his sad and lonesome cheek.
His breath comes in white gusts of wind,
snowflakes fill the air.
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ABOUT THE POET ~
Lisa Zaran was born in 1969 in Los Angeles, California. She is an American poet, essayist and the author of seven collections including If It We, The Blondes Lay Content and the sometimes girl, the latter of which was the focus of a year long translation course in Germany. Subsequently published to German in 2006 under the title: das manchmal mädchen. Selections from her other books have been translated to Bangla, Hindi, Arabic, Chinese, German, Dutch, Persian and Serbian. Her poems have appeared in hundreds of literary journals, magazines, broadsides, anthologies and e-zines
Last updated March 29, 2011