Self-Portrait as Anne Sexton’s Typewriter

By Hilary King

Not upright and boxy as my predecessors,
I was lean and long and tan. I was modern.
I was her pet, wasn’t I? It was me she loved,
me she wanted to be with first, later, last.
Not the husband, the lovers, the betrayers. 
Interrupted from our hour by her daughter, 
she flung me at that daughter. And Reader, 
I leapt into mother’s violence, my keys of steel 
clacking, my carriage swinging, my ribbon spooling
to be back alone with my mistress, to be teased 
by her nicotine-scented fingers. Don’t pretend, 
Writer, you haven’t lifted your instrument, hefted 
its weight in a clenched fist when another voice 
calling your false name pierces the lovely, empty page. 

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Originally from the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, Hilary King is a poet now living in the San Francisco Bay Area of California. Her poems have appeared or will appear in Ploughshares, TAB, Salamander, Belletrist, Fourth River, The Cortland Review, and other publications. She is the author of the book of poems, The Maid’s Car. She is currently studying for her MFA degree at San Jose State University, where she is a Steinbeck Fellow.

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