Dan Sicoli The 2River View, 7.2 (Winter 2003)
Shim

a brilliance less maddening

clearly
it was obvious
billie holiday had pocketed her demons
like found coins

as if in her spirit
my lover was falling backward in this cosmic petri dish
spinning spinning
an oblique grindstone in the sun

clearly with a touched and deliberate timbre
sorrow spotted her ordinary empire
like ripening bananas

in a vintage coat that displayed what she was made of
she walked with me
both hands squeezing my arm
drenched in chemical vulnerability
as a winter machine
swooped down
and hocked our dawn

her painterly fingers tracing
a likeness of a galloping stallion
into the ashen snow
on the hood of my chevy
became a lasting memory

eleanora eleanora
your aboriginal beauty outlasts the storm
never a question of what you kept
never a regret for things handed down

i remain
fingering one pocketed nickel
listening to a needle
grind out
an endless spinning line

Shim
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