Angle of Separation
Rent from DeepDyve- Angle of Separation
The blue treesof winterstand at intervalswith naked branches. [End Page 130]
Even when the sun touchesthem like the thirdcircle in the archer'starget, their burntcherry twigs hardly flinch.
A train passesin the distance,carrying its cargoof smokers in black jackets.
How seldom,the moments whenanguish lets goits hold on the littlechlorine pool,the trellised courtyard.
And it must be sofor me as well.
My break with the pastwill be taken customarily,as a crust of breador a few flakes of snowfalling surreptitiouslyinto my mouthto sever my tongue. [End Page 131]
Judith Skillman is the author of thirteen collections, including Heat Lightning: New & Selected Poems 1986-2006 (Silverfish Review P.) She is the recipient of grants and awards from Washington State Arts Commission, Academy of American Poets, and other organizations. Her poems have appeared in Poetry, Southern Review, Northwest Review, Midwest Quarterly, and other journals and anthologies.
