Wash by Susan Tepper

At night you wash the cream from your arms
thick petals, once staked to flowers
Fill a ceiling gone to roses then still—

Vase on the window ledge, half murky
half done, and bugs are hovering
specks in shifting light: that room stayed in

Every season its walls, mold

The radiator hissing steam around
a river that carries you back—

Wet gutters stream mirrors
the dawn a red sunrise: the
One child, dropped from your body one leaf.

Originally published in Blue Edge chapbook from Cervena Barva Press.

Susan Tepper is a twenty year writer in all genres, and the author of nine published books.  Her most recent are CONFESS (a poetry chapbook by Cervena Barva Press, 2020) and a quirky road novel WHAT DRIVES MEN (Wilderness House Press, 2019).  Currently Tepper is in pre-production of an Off-Bdwy play titled THE CROOKED HEART which she based on artist Jackson Pollock’s later years.

www.susantepper.com