Carousel #2

By Jen Rouse

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It’s #tbt! Enjoy this great one from SWWIM Every Day‘s archives!

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The beveled mirrors hold
you open to the sky. Reglazed 
and lit to dazzle. Sometimes
I am waltzing with you 
there. Your wig elaborate 
and winged with birds. 
The woman in the painting
next door runs through 
the pasture wild, unbridled. How
I always want you this way.
Gleaming teeth, eyes that spark
and gallop. We are in worlds split,
untimed, and tragic. So stop
tapping at the glass because I
cannot take you. I raise my hand
to touch your hand to still you there.
(Oh the tapping.) We look beside
ourselves, and I become your
mouth moving so quickly, and you
become my finger against these lips.
The carousel keeps us fixed in place.
I want to tell you this thing about
the way you dance inside me.  
Endless. The circles. No sound.

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Jen Rouse's most recent book is Fragments of V from Small Harbor Publishing. She is the author of four books of poetry from Headmistress Press: A Trickle of Bloom Becomes You, Riding with Anne Sexton, CAKE, and Acid & Tender. Rouse directs the Center for Teaching and Learning at Cornell College.

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