Documentation

Sigh lanced
like Jesus pierced
I will cry alone instead
of bleed – and plead
what innocence
I ascertain – so tired
of being
my own
advocate. and you
blameless in your
corner – drawing
the line and redrawing
the times I stepped
over it. you need me
to agree – I want to
get out and over,
the rain
as a cover
to wash me clean.

 

 

 

 

Wake

 

I’ll wake this world for you
each sunrise to the moon
stretched taut and drawn
back waiting for the arrow
You are the mark, darkened
by time and terrible space
this is what remains of
love, a grove of flowering
trees, the songs of birds
the emptiness of no promise
or prediction – the knowledge
that time does move – never
backwards, but ahead – in front
of itself, and it takes us along.

 

 

 

Anne Elezabeth Pluto is Professor of Literature and Theatre at Lesley University in Cambridge, MA where she is the artistic director and one of the founders of the Oxford Street Players, the university’s Shakespeare troupe. She is an alumna of Shakespeare & Company and has been a member of the Worcester Shakespeare Company since 2011. She was a member of the Boston small press scene in the late 1980s and is one of the founders and editors at Nixes Mate Review.  Her chapbook, The Frog Princess, was published by White Pine Press (1985), her chapbook Benign Protection by Cervana Barva Press (2016) and her chapbook Lubbock Electric by Nixes Mate Books (2018). Recent publications include: The Buffalo Evening News, Unlikely Stories: Episode IV, Mat Hat Lit, Pirene’s Fountain, The Enchanting Verses Literary Review, MockingHeart Review, Yellow Chair Review, Levure Litteraire – numero 12, The Naugatuck River Review, and Tuesday, An Art Project.