Salt on Skin
Rent from DeepDyve- Salt on Skin
for Ami
I quit America for a sabra,who emptied a shelf and swept sandfrom the basement we shared
with her seamed and slender grandma.She taught me Hebrewand I followed her up mountains
to watch goats graze, through the Negevwhere earth cracks, sun screamsand the body becomes a bruise.
She showed me how sweetness growsinside a cactus, but I had to strip it down.I had to know the needles.
That summer I promised her I'd be a poet.I returned to Ohio and found Whitmanand Thoreau. She gave me [End Page 149]
the desert with its savage songwhere a cactus needs almost nothingto grow. Like salt on skin.
Shelley Savren's book, The Common Fire, was published by Red Hen Press. She holds an MFA from Antioch University Los Angeles. Her work is widely published in literary magazines, including Solo, Prairie Schooner, Santa Clara Review, Main Street Rag, and Bridges: A Jewish Feminist Journal. Her awards include nine California Arts Council Artist in Residence grants, two National Endowment for the Arts regional grants, four artist fellowships from the City of Ventura, and first place in the John David Johnson Memorial Poetry Award. She lives in Ventura, California, with her husband and teaches writing full-time at Oxnard College.
