By Elizabeth Austen
I claim I’ll go
full of curiosity.
But darling we both know
I always want one more
kiss, another drag
off the scent of your neck.
No reason to think I’ll die
differently than I live—
hungry for one more mouthful
of honey, craving another
blossom’s cargo of yellow, more,
one more bass note caressing
my sternum, one
more saltwater swim.
I’m sure to try
to pull along
some cone or frond,
grain of sand
in my swimsuit,
pistachio stuck in my teeth—
to praise this world
by hauling what I can
into the next.
Darling, sweet pants,
don’t stand
too close
at the end.
******
Copyright Austen 2012
Elizabeth Austen 's poems -- almost all of them -- in her debut poetry collection, Every Dress a Decision (Blue Begonia Press, 2011), were drafted or revised on an island, though she lives in West Seattle. She’s written at the Whiteley Center on San Juan, at the Artsmith residency on Orcas and at Hedgebrook and friends’ homes on Whidbey.
She’s also the author of two chapbooks, The Girl Who Goes Alone (Floating Bridge Press, 2010) and Where Currents Meet (one of four winners of the 2010 Toadlily Press chapbook award and part of the quartet Sightline). Her poems have been featured on Garrison Keillor’s The Writer’s Almanac and Verse Daily, and in journals including the Los Angeles Review, Bellingham Review and Willow Springs. She was the Washington “roadshow poet” and is the literary producer for KUOW 94.9 public radio. Find her online at elizabethausten.org.
All work by Elizabeth Austen
