Carlene M. Gadapee teaches high school English and is the Associate Creative Director for The Frost Place Studio Sessions. Her poems have been published by Waterwheel Review, Smoky Quartz, Margate Bookie, English Journal, bloodroot, Wild Words, and elsewhere. Carlene resides with her husband in northern New Hampshire.
American Still Life with Milk
In my imagination, a milkman jingles to a stop,
tossing slack reins across an aging draw-horse’s
ample back. With practiced hands, he deftly
rattles the empties into faded wooden crates
to fill again. Cooled bottles glisten and wink,
and condensation beads at the rim. Tiny rivers
run and spot and dry on the dusty wagon bed.
“Git on Bessie,” echoes in my ears, recalling
times I never lived, and bottles I never held.
Coming Storms
Sheet lightning stretches
and winks. The metallic
smell of ozone is in the air.
No snug little house cradled
by beach roses, no fence
to stop sand from sifting
over the threshold. No old
woman lives here, only
horseshoe crabs. Tiny plovers
scuttle across broken steps,
etching letters into dust.
Greying and splintered
shutters creak on rusted
hinges, unable to block wind
and rain. No one visits,
not even to straighten
a broken chair or to sweep
one careful hand along
a silted sill. There’s no story.
Just shadows and ghosts.
