Swan

By Ana Božičević b. 1977 Ana Božičević

Amy, Amy, at this distance you’re

the smell of liver,

tinnitus that keeps me up, afraid:

your fortressness must now be tested.

The way you took me in without

a surfeit click or

gesture: seagull kerchief

binding my gut to safety

on the swimming haul

among night-images. I went to the place I was born

and it plainly was a bride. So I ran after her.

When she turned into a star I swallowed her.

And out of this uneasiness will come

an aster.

Amy, I’m inside my granddad’s mind of wood:

the grass is finer, constellations thicker.

The plums are normal. How

much sugar did you buy

alone at Waldbaums?

Brook reeds here

wake from your hair’s soul’s chilly patronage.

The hair’s the soul, the reeds

its body—alone in their beds

like schoolgirls:

I feel and feel them up.

The cigarettes

have made them crazy! But a rabbit someone

flows out of the embankment

and I shiver for you, Amy

oh lengthy dappled wig:

there’s a swan in your breathing.

There always is.

Ana Bozicevic, "Swan" from Stars of the Night Commute. Copyright © 2009 by Ana Bozicevic. Reprinted by permission of Tarpaulin Sky Press.

Source: Stars of the Night Commute (Tarpaulin Sky Press, 2009)

Biography

Born in Zagreb, Croatia, Božičević emigrated to New York City in 1997 and studied at Hunter College. She is the author of several chapbooks, including Morning News (2006) and Document (2007). Her first book-length collection, Stars of the Night Commute (2009), was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Awards.

Travelers and messengers figure in Božičević’s dreamlike poems of shifting diction, narrative, and settings. Chris . . .

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