Marie Louise Munro
Keeping House: Alone
I listen for spoons clinking complaints,
weary of dullness, of their scant
weight. They dream of gypsy
caravans, of sleeping upside-down
from nails in boisterous moonlight.
All night long I calculate how to keep
the muttering books from jumping off
the shelves, how to quiet the mad
lamp's hiss, the crackling bravado
of moths. But I must let the fan's
breath caress my body into sleep
where my ears open to hear
impatiens crying on the windowsills,
weeping new tendrils of flame.
Bio
Marie Louise Munro's poetry has appeared and/or is forthcoming in the following: American Oral, Cicada, Dánta: a poetry journal, Frogpond Journal, Haiku Presence, A Hundred Gourds, Manuscript, Modern Haiku, paper wasp and Parnassus Literary Journal. Marie has received a M.F.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Notre Dame and lives in a suburb of Los Angeles with her fiancé and their three cats.