She trades in skin,
keeps the scraps in a diary of ‘lids,
holds each like a fibrillary:
Intended to forget.
This wrong word, this bad color.
Is it they who make the time sour?
She has thought of herself as a laundress:
a curator, a maid, an empress.
None can argue otherwise,
if the proposition’s vouchsafed.
So, go to your green room:
The place you feel but never see.
And pluck for me a flock of paints,
that recall nothing but that she owns them.
∞
Born in Austin, Will Pewitt has taught fiction at a variety of institutions from the University of Arizona, where he earned his M.F.A. to the University of North Florida, where he currently he currently teaches global literature. His work has appeared in over a dozen journals, most recently The Literary Review.
Visit his website: wpewitt.com
