After the Sniper
Lois P. Jones

you came to the conclusion
a story must be told backwards
Once at the well of her throat

amethyst beads on the carpet
her palm flat against the floor
Embers in the last darkening

plum burnt and ash heavy
A pomegranate not yet split
with a knife

The curtain closed
after a season of bullets
One burst through

the frosted glass
knocking out a tooth
How she slumped

behind the lace drape
and its white
eyelashes     Her salt

still glistening on the brow
Of this     a day where
the sun rose as a fig

of untouched juices
Her book open to a page
of wild irises bent over

a canal of saints—
two lovers      making
whatever they could




Glass: A Journal of Poetry

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