My father built us a house
with solid front doors, thick
enough to save us from wolves.
He hoped every exit would hold
tight to its jamb. But arms come
with hinges. Harsh is the opening
when you can’t see what’s coming.
Puberty through a peephole
never dares to knock. How fast
blood sets. Rust on flesh makes you
trip on the splintered threshold.
As the siding of my home peeled
back, I tried to hide my face
in childhood, thought I could refuse
to leave my room. But the scratch
of hunger kept clawing. The shag
pattern, swirl of white-pink-red
repeated itself from vanity to canopy
bed. Pollen kept light from looking
in and I found myself lost in the woods
wringing the life out of question marks,
their soiled hems unforgiving.
BETH OAST WILLIAM‘s poetry has been accepted for publication in Leon Literary Review, SWWIM Everyday, Pirene’s Fountain, Wisconsin Review, Glass Mountain, GASHER, Fjords Review, and Rattle’s Poets Respond, among others. Her poems have been long-listed for Palette Poetry’s Sappho Prize and nominated twice for the Pushcart Prize. Her first chapbook, Riding Horses in the Harbor (Finishing Line Press), was published in 2020. She serves on the board of The Muse Writers Center in Norfolk, Virginia. Website: BethOastWilliams.com
REBECCA PYLE, named at birth for Daphne du Maurier’s and Hitchcock’s masterpieces, Rebecca, is both writer and artist whose artwork and writing are in Fugue, The Chattahoochee Review, Muse/A Journal, JuxtaProse, The Menteur, Cobalt Review, The Hong Kong Review, New England Review, Gargoyle, The Kleksograph, and The Penn Review. Pyle has lived the past decade or two in Utah, not terribly far from the often cloud-draped Great Salt Lake and its many small islands continually hosting migrating birds. Her artwork has appeared on covers of over a dozen journals, and within many others. Website: rebeccapyleartist.com
