Poetry by Sarah Browning

Sensitive

Visiting family in the Virginia countryside –
I am 9, maybe, or 10 – tumble of cousin-joy
and swimming holes. Over supper one night,

corn pudding sticky on all our tongues,
the grownups talk: an accident on the road
nearby – a bike, a man. And though we

do not learn the outcome, later I cannot sleep.
I head down to the kitchen in my summer nightie
to find my mother. It is the last time I seek

her comfort. She names me sensitive
to the other grownups – their card games
and scotch – gives me a glass of milk

and sends me back to bed. I lie in the humid
cricket night: broken man, mangled bike,
alongside me.

Parted

The rain turns hard, lashing the city –
bus shelter, tattoo parlor, shoeshine stand, lone taxi

She straggles down the street to a dive bar, umbrella straining,
the word bereft on her fingers

TVs dark, kitchens shut, smokers restless
in doorways, bouncers indifferent to the rain

still checking IDs You know me she pleads

*

During the trial separation
he visits, and suggests they have sex.

Maybe if he’d brushed her ass
or placed a hand lightly at her waist

she’d have said yes, hungry as touch
always reminds her she is hungry. […]

I split the cherries with my teeth

pried out the pit and slipped the meat
to you across the car seat, and you –
that ravening toddler who knew
only desire desire – clamored
for more ‘til your grandma tsk’ed
at such excess, that I gave you
everything, that you were stained
by it – ripe red cherry juice
on your fingers and face.

I would not shame you.
I was red, too, and pulsing, too, […]

I’m not angry, I’m disappointed

In the latest dream
in which I have the lead

but do not know my lines
the director is a woman

I cannot bear to tell her

My mother did not
yell but stood

very still, quivering

___________________________________