ROCHELLE JEWEL SHAPIRO
NIGHT WINDOW
(Edward Hopper, 1928)
Out-blown blue curtain,
a wall of lamplight, carpet
like new-mown grass.
In an alcove, a small room
lit red. A woman in a full slip
bends, maybe to take off
her stockings, her bare arms
and legs
. the color of tallow.
On the block of my childhood
once lived a woman
who stood in her lit window
at night, her slip, ecru, her hair
Jean Harlow white-blonde.
Stay away from the window,
Mother warned. Men will think
you’re like her.
. I was ten years old.
Some nights I put on my mother’s
slip, the lace straps slipping off
my narrow shoulders, the hem
puddling over the linoleum
. like a nylon river.
What are you doing? Mother calls.
Get in bed and don’t make me
. come in there.
I cut the light,
. but stand at the window.
Rochelle Jewel Shapiro (@rjshapiro) is the author of Miriam the Medium (Simon & Schuster, 2004), which was nominated for the Harold U. Ribelow Award, and just reissued as a book and ebook. Shapiro has published essays in NYT (Lives), Newsweek, and more. Her poetry, short stories, and essays have appeared or are forthcoming in literary magazines such as The Iowa Review, Poet Lore, Los Angeles Review, Entropy Magazine, and Gulf Coast. Her poetry has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and The Best of the Net. Shapiro currently teaches writing at UCLA Extension. For more, visit https://rochellejshapiro.com.
