KAREN CORCORAN DABKOWSKI

The Poetry Of.
Karen Corcoran....................................
Dabkowski....................................

In A Morning Of Such Longing

Before the birds'
first cries, before the cars lay tracks
on the white that's come in the night
once more,

before
the cats are alert, lay
curled and breathing
evenly,

I sit here scratching characters
on a screen.

It's a form of prayer
I've come to believe
will save the tenderest parts of me in a morning
of such longing. I watch my fingers not church-spired
up, but gently cupped
and curved,
quickly communicating
with the dead, who are the
only ones
who listen at this hour. They strain
to hear me

and I talk.

Balance And Ballast

I've been thinking about
some things
in regard to relationships
that are
unbalanced. For instance, where
one
does all the giving, supporting
and propping up, the wiping the nose, the fanning
of the ego
so it rises like a phoenix
from its crash
sites,
and it occurred to me that on a ship
the weight
is called the ballast,
and it
stabilizes the hull, and it's
often dull, tucked
down in the cargo
hold, but necessary if the ship's
to stay afloat.

But if a person is the ballast
in a horribly
unbalanced
craft, in time
the weight
is merely weight, the ship sinking into the waves
of everyday
where the hanger-on
may attach to another
maybe
younger, maybe richer, maybe
unfettered
by old commitments, obligations
such as
children, ex-wives,
husbands, may see
a likelier
catch,
a schooner
not a barge (though the barge was handy
when the drowning did seem imminent) it's become

just weight

and those poor souls, just
wait, it happens all the time, be frugal

in the way
you give your lives
to them.

Horse Gone Lame

No, not really
lame
but he is limping, banging his nose
into the paddock. Maybe he is blind
and all those stars above
are speaking,
telling him
to
run,
run, the glue
man's
on his way. Lame horse

corralled
by his deepest fears.

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