Nothing Like a Shipment of Pears


My brain more tilt 

than opening. 

I am in a store 

buying bread

with my mother. 

The long aisles 

of my memory

surface unexpectedly.

A friend’s body unwinds itself.

In the slowest of panic. 

I’m tired of hearing.

I don’t write anymore

but hold each pose

like a fence of lights. 

In the operating room 

my body’s theatre 

sliced open to applause.

When I wake

there are enough 

miniature clothes

for a baby and a dog.

Carrie Bennett is a Massachusetts Cultural Council Artist Fellow and author of biography of water, The Land Is a Painted Thing, and several chapbooks from dancing girl press. Her third book, Lost Letters and Other Animals,will be published by Black Lawrence Press in early 2021. Her poems have appeared in numerous journals including Boston ReviewCaketrainDenver Quarterly, and jubilat. She holds an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and currently teaches writing at Boston University. She lives with her husband and daughter in Somerville, MA.

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