qarrtsiluni

by Leslie Ann Minot

sturdy, but not strong enough
to hang herself with, and long,

useful for tying tomatoes
in spring and early summer,
for bundling flattened boxes,
or for the coarser kind of kite.

Her friend has been making maps of emptiness,
the spaces in between
the islands’ separateness,
a blankness crossed by lines.

In the hardware store, Ariadne takes her time,
running her fingers through the bins of nails
and screws, shiny and full of hope
that the world can hold together.

She sings in her native tongue, softly,
making sure the old man at the counter sees her.

They say she’s a witch, how else
could she come here dishonored and marry
the island’s richest god? A foreigner,
she knows she can make them say anything
by wearing red patent-leather slingback pumps
every day of summer, even on the mountain’s
twisting goat tracks.

It’s the untangling that matters.

These climbs are nothing
if you’ve walked barefoot from your past
and stumbled into joy.

The twine is cheap, and gossip costs still less.
The town is hungry for it.

Her friend may shrug. “Witchcraft—who believes?”
But grief is superstitious. Ariadne thinks
her friend will be preoccupied with twine.
Unwinding. Finding uses.
She hopes for long enough.

Ariadne knows: Grief is not about
the shortest distance between two points.
It’s about getting out alive.

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Leslie Ann Minot received an MFA in Creative Writing from Goddard College in 2004, and has previously published poetry and translations of poetry in The Chicago Review, The Red Rock Review, New Letters, and neon geyser/porcelain sky. She has published critical articles in The European Romantic Review and Excavatio, as well as in collections on Victorian sensation fiction, Caribbean literature, Georges Sand, and Muriel Rukeyser.

by Leslie Ann Minot

…I bid my hideous progeny go forth and prosper. I have an affection for it…
Mary Shelley, “Introduction,” Frankenstein (1831)

daughters & monsters—

I often think of Mary, patiently unwinding the skein
of her nightmares, sentence after sentence,
on the carefully blotted page,
through a labyrinth of dead-end relationships,
not least of all with death—

we run off,
bodies of chaos,

with poets, passing heroes
bound for Attic wars,
revolutionaries, boys
with motorcycles, worse still,

other women—

like Mary, I have stopped trying to decide
if it is a hero in the shape of a monster, a monster
in the shape of a hero, a mask with the eyes
of a hero or monster behind—

we enter the world
breathing consequences—
nothing but trouble,

even the most dutiful daughter
will one day make her bed

& roll in it in ecstasy—

fathers & mourners

when you write about Mary’s achievements, I see
we are not reading the same story & I have stopped
trying to tell you that I will never stop
trying to tell you, I will tell story
after misread story—

you stand stiff
in your doorways

faces carved by the traces
of angry tears you cry
& do not cry.
the dream of betrayal

is an old story

but when the last doubtful hero has abandoned the quest
& the ship turns back, where the darkened
water meets the glare of frozen waste, Mary awakens
to who & what remains, staring back the black waves
as they break—

daughters & monsters,

knowing love fails.
wanting to believe

love leaves us

fearless in its wake—

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Leslie Ann Minot received an MFA in Creative Writing from Goddard College in 2004, and has previously published poetry and translations of poetry in The Chicago Review, The Red Rock Review, New Letters, and neon geyser/porcelain sky. She has published critical articles in The European Romantic Review and Excavatio, as well as in collections on Victorian sensation fiction, Caribbean literature, Georges Sand, and Muriel Rukeyser. Currently, she is watching too much Dark Shadows on video.

by Leslie Ann Minot

Real bombs go off, and famine chases droughts,
while markets crash and burn like satellites.
The world is far too much, and full of doubts.
Only old movies get us through these nights.
We envy tuxedo pleats and savoir faire,
the gold and the guns, the girl in the gown,
the danger and the daring not to care.
Whether or not we choose, we all go down
the mountain in a cello case. It’s nice
to go down as Bond, bow tie to socks,
as cool as a martini. Over ice
we sweat and swear, careening on the rocks,
machine-gunned, knuckles clenched, and vision blurred.
Most of us are shaken; a few are stirred.
__________

Notes: The cello case chase is a well-known Bond segment from the 1987 The Living Daylights. The World Is Not Enough is the 1999 offering from the franchise.

Download the podcast

Leslie Ann Minot received an MFA in Creative Writing from Goddard College in 2004, and has previously published poetry and translations of poetry in The Chicago Review, The Red Rock Review, New Letters, and neon geyser/porcelain sky. She has published critical articles in The European Romantic Review and Excavatio, as well as in collections on Victorian sensation fiction, Caribbean literature, Georges Sand, and Muriel Rukeyser. Currently, she is watching too much Dark Shadows on video.