The second and final poem we will be sharing from Barbara as of now. The story-like quality of both “Her Seven Faces” and “Going Home” were impressive to us, and we imagine you’ll agree. Enjoy.
Do you enter from a garage,
step into a laundry room clacking
and steamy with cleanness?
Or slide a glass door down a track
bumpy with sunflower hulls
left by finches and chickadees?
Do you wipe your feet? Your hand
sorts through mail on a desk
by a door. The skin on the backs
of your fingers. The single
broken nail. I rest my forehead
on my own door. After a while, I go in.
Barbara Daniels’s Talk to the Lioness was published by Casa de Cinco Hermanas Press in 2020. Her poetry has appeared in Prairie Schooner, Mid-American Review, and elsewhere. Barbara Daniels received a 2020 fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts.