Her Misfortune by Lisa Zaran

She wants what she can not have
and isn’t that always the way?
The sunset fades, and from her yard
she waits for the first stars to appear.
With arms crossed around her disobedient
body, she waits for him to announce himself,
a sharp blade in her heart, a rush of warm
that greets in her some presence she can’t ignore.
What she allows and takes from him will be all
she could ever hope to know in this or any
one of a thousand lifetimes.

The moon rises and she thinks of him.
The sky deepens to a cool shade of onyx
and she thinks of him. Her thoughts rise
through the silence to cling to the soft belly
of heaven. Stars shine like a poets phrase
and she thinks of him. She lets no feeling
pass without directing it at his pink heart.
He sits in a room across town attuned
to a new rhythm, like leaves rustling.
Leaves rustling inside him.

Lisa Zaran is an American poet, essayist, occasional interviewer and the author of six collections. Her first book, the sometimes girl, was recently the focus of a year long translation course in Germany. She is the founder and editor of Contemporary American Voices, an online journal of poetry, which has now been approved to be used as the subject of study for a translation course in Germany.