I Know How The Story Is Supposed To End

I keep waiting for the woodsman

with his handy ax.

Instead I meet wolves in white lab coats –

scalpels like pointed teeth hide in their pockets.

Stethoscopes dangle from their necks.

They answer my questions in percentiles;

smile with professional warmth.

Everywhere I turn big eyes

examine me.

I am magnified in images

of white on black.

I would run off the forest path

but even bigger teeth lurk nearby

quick to snap at weakness.  --Suzy Lamson

Driving Across The Bridge

The pavement slides

beneath my wheels like breath.

I am driving across this bridge

imagining the steel girders

above me are your ribs,

and the slow pulse

of the broken yellow line

is your pulse, and the dull

gray of the sky –

the color of the hospital ceiling.

I wonder if what I am seeing

is at all like what you see:

fog on the river, fog on the shore,

the red of a lighthouse fading,

windows, shingles

blending into white –

just the outline of the lighthouse,

the slender border

between it and everything,

all I can see,

just the faintest

outlines in fog.  --Sally Bliumis-Dunn