In the Dining Room on the Third Floor
by Alice Duggan
The dining room spreads like a cold pasture at the top
of the afternoon. Somewhere to be, a choice to make
among shrunken choices. As I settle myself two people
come, wheeling to separate spots on the fence line,
woman and man. I turn my back and call my friend.
I reassure her also myself: yes, I’ll get better.
We say goodbye. When I turn around, I see the woman
crossing wide spaces to the big man who has parked himself
against a wall. He’s John Wayne folded in two.
She speaks to him softly, her hippie-long hair falling
down her back. Takes her jean jacket and wraps him in it.
She rubs his broad shoulders, his back. Soft words.
He stays immobile, speechless, unhorsed.
I close my phone. I watch. He speaks a few words
to her, at last.
Does he feel better now? Does she?
of the afternoon. Somewhere to be, a choice to make
among shrunken choices. As I settle myself two people
come, wheeling to separate spots on the fence line,
woman and man. I turn my back and call my friend.
I reassure her also myself: yes, I’ll get better.
We say goodbye. When I turn around, I see the woman
crossing wide spaces to the big man who has parked himself
against a wall. He’s John Wayne folded in two.
She speaks to him softly, her hippie-long hair falling
down her back. Takes her jean jacket and wraps him in it.
She rubs his broad shoulders, his back. Soft words.
He stays immobile, speechless, unhorsed.
I close my phone. I watch. He speaks a few words
to her, at last.
Does he feel better now? Does she?
Alice Duggan's poems have appeared in Sleet Magazine, Water~Stone Review, Tar River Poetry, and Alaska Quarterly Review, and elsewhere. Her poems are also in a chapbook, A Brittle Thing, and an anthology, Home, from Holy Cow! Press. She’s interested in dailiness, in colloquial speech, the rhythm of voices, and in telling stories.