REBECCA GIVENS ROLLAND

The House with the Bright Locked Door

We once called it guilt                 nameless morning

green ease summoning                     shirred-off light

disputes over                   who weighed flag’s forty stars

who cleaned the chimney                       who hosted

this heart best                this heart’s beast           sheer ice

flitters at eaves      calves away              ephemeral

oaks ask have you tried hard                   grafted branches

constantly forgetting                   wind’s accidental

pressure in lark-leaf space                      between drips

of winter-worn roof                        our neighbor’s

always clearer than ours                          you wash

hands’ backs                          this day                    refuse adornment

weightless         blue taffeta cloth           claim sky’s

ours as we invisibly                    age toward invisible

every year we try not to tally                   and fail

who’s had time for thought                        silence gifted

today                  swallowed tomorrow                  cumulus

stops up all argument                                ash leaves

refuse to tremble                         we know their reasons

as we know this day’s edges                          aren’t ours

Rebecca Givens Rolland won the Dana Award in Short Fiction, and her fiction has appeared in Slice, Michigan Quarterly Review, The Literary Review, and others. Her first book, The Wreck of Birds, won the May Sarton New Hampshire First Book Prize and was published by Bauhan Publishing.