Four Jane Poems

P is for Prologue

Jane is smart, but not as smart as her husband.Jane was smart, but not as smart as her father.Jane is smart enough to know her mothershould not have let Jane knowthat Jane's derelict brother outscored Janeon the IQ test. Sometimes you have to hideyour light under a bushel, Jane once hearda professor tell his junior colleague.His colleague couldn't stop talking. She couldn'tstop talking because she wasn't pretty.When a pretty woman gets oldshe sometimes starts talking. Jane mightbe getting ready when she hidesbefore the mirror pluckingher new gray hairs.

Jane in the Passenger Seat

The floorboards are wet. The heater is gusting. The skyis low; the fields blank. You'll have toask Dad that, Jane answers. The backseat does notask Dad that. It is February in New England.The destination is Trader Joe's.

Jane knows that centuries ago women crossed fieldsto deliver their neighbors' children. They wore snowshoes,brought honey, rum, and butter. The snowwas stirred like their skirts. The snowwas crusted like sleep. The snow

was deep. (The heat is on, Jane tells the backseat.)As the sky was low, the night was sudden.The sun, like desire, had occurred.Jane thinks of wool cloaks congregating on pegswhile the women attended travail. It was hard,

it was very hard & dangerous. The motherwas under very Dangerous Circumstances,as God intended. Big house little house back house barn,Jane chants to no one. She will forgetthe pickles. She will remember butter and honey. She will see her husbandstanding by a cardboard cupid,hands in the pockets of his dirty coat,staring at nothing. Soon, she tells the backseat,which is nearly true.

After a night, or several, a woman emergedwith news. My wife was Delivered,a man recorded. His life — his work —resumed. The fields needed paths.The animals needed hay. The snow, the wind, the cold —

nothing abated. A passenger's job is to help.Sometimes a passenger can't helpbut ask the driver what's wrong.

S is for Souvenir

… and then, through a window, Jane saw a fox.Saw a fox and thought, Foxes are small.The fox was a dash, a vanishing

fact. You only see a fox.You only have seen it. Jane at dawnwith a small thought

and a tube of biscuits.

Jane in the Guest Room

Jane wants to wear the necklace she brought: it would pleaseher mother. But everything that pleases

Jane's mother is what's wrong with Jane's mother.Jane is a very attractive woman, says her mother,

by which she means I need to lose ten pounds. Jane needsto lose ten needs: the need to disprove,

the need to need, the need to disapprove,the need to use the dusty treadmill in her mother's basement.

The necklace, like all jewelry, is meant to mean. It meansthat Jane is Jane's mother's daughter. (The need

to claim.) The necklace is faceted, like a concession.The necklace is red, like a confession.

Wear the necklace, Jane, Jane thinks.In the kitchen Jane's mother will be

waiting. The need to hide, the need to be seen.The need to hide the need to be seen. There you are,

her mother will say. The need to be right,the need to repeat. Jane's mother is right:

Jane should wear more color.