THE LINCOLN REVIEW
GIACOMETTI
Limbs elongated
to the point of illusion,
a woman is fashioned
into a line. She rises above me,
with all the grace of her geometry.
The pitted marks in the bronze
seem intimate—every surface dimpled
by a fingerprint. I carry her image
in my mind, touching her metal flesh
to mesh her skin and mine. Years later and far
from home, I see another sculpture by the artist:
A smooth, writhing bug splayed open at the neck. Woman
with Her Throat Cut. Femme égorgée. Woman
with her spine arched, woman
with her legs bent, split as if giving birth, woman
with her head thrown back, mouth open
as if she could be laughing.
CAVE DWELLING
Walking the plains, I feel
dread. All that menacing
open sky. Buzzards spy
me from above, trace
the whole of my figure, see
through my skin, know me.
I move under the cover
of rock, into a nature-made
void. Deep in the cold stone,
the looking is all mine. I feel
the root of my tongue rise
up toward its roof. My eyes
sink deep into their sockets.
I envision scenarios of
disaster: revolts of smoke,
water, wind. The body plots
against itself, brewing
conspiracies. I’m a vile mother
to thoughts. I send them
out to be eaten by predatory
birds, but they flow back
at night with the jabber
of the stream. I made a fire
to burn the thoughts,
but there were birds’ eyes
swirled in the wood grain,
and they watched me. No
more fire. No light.
My thoughts press against
me in the dark. I turn
my back to the cave mouth.
All is well and good, I say
to the cave. The echo
mouth speaks when spoken
to: All is well and good.
Lauren Winchester's poems have appeared in The Journal, Passages North, THRUSH, TYPO, BOAAT, and elsewhere. She has been awarded artist in residency fellowships by the Edward Albee Foundation, the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, and Oak Spring Garden Foundation. She received her MFA in poetry from The Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University.
ISSN 2632-4423