For my seventh birthday before he stopped celebrating anything but Jewish holidays, my father sent a gold bracelet speckled with my birthstone. I was more comfortable in T-shirts and baseball mitt. I loved to wrestle, shock with vulgar words. Such a mouth. The delicate bangle looked tiny in the white box meant for girls in frilly dresses with fathers who scoop them up. How could it fit on this wrist cocked for battle? I stared down at the red stones floating in the gold river. Whose hand is this? Whose father?
Pamela Hill Epps’ work has most recently appeared in the anthology 101 Jewish Poems For The Third Millennium (Ashland Poetry Press) as well as in other literary publications such as Heartwood Literary Magazine, The Closed Eye Open, and Poetry Breakfast. She has published A Last Glance, a chapbook with YellowJacket Press. She is a psychologist, poet, and jazz musician living in Tampa, Fl. She spends a great deal of time looking out at the river.
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12/19 / Meet the Artist with visiting poet-in-residence Kristen Renee Miller / The Library at The Betsy-South Beach, Miami Beach, FL / Live and Live-Streamed on Instagram Live/Facebook Live at @swwimmiami / 6:00 pm EST / Free
12/19 / Poetry Reading with visiting poet-in-residence Kristen Renee Miller + Arsimmer McCoy / The Library at The Betsy-South Beach, Miami Beach, FL / Live and Live-Streamed on Instagram Live/Facebook Live at @swwimmiami / 7:30 pm EST / Free
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Love every line but especially "...this wrist / cocked for battle"