D a n a  T e e n  L o m a x

Relationship Analogy

silence: hesitation::

the wax melted and floating, candles--every room, signs of an early romance, scented, relighting several times a night:

middle ground, brushed our teeth a lot each day, spaces between letters, hiding, formation of the expected:

how things turn, eye witness to the whole gradation, feet of clay and gimme that quarter back:

recessed bloom, color and the erect nipples held both in his mouth at once, a definite attraction:

pending, skewed timeframe, the addition crumbling like odd syntax, watch meaning accrue:

as yet undiagnosed, telephone ring, chai tea

check's in the mail, an investment in latex:

reconstructing the trail guide, we clocked it at over four miles uphill all the way, road on which everyone waves, scary in moonlight,
deer in the path, quail stir

unclear directives, an alarm bird, the history we did know and the reasons to disalign oneself

between roadways, apparent

the missing cut-off, as if, we knew what was coming and didn't turn back:

far from the top, notch on perfection, the charm, nicks and scratches on both of us, framed in glasses, put something in your eyes
for looks:

knife resting on a plate, along with sliced fruit in erotic patterns, I eat those, he said, and he did:

upper lip quiver before speech, couldn't hold a glance:

resorting to kindling, one hand in my pants, ritualistic, a definite attraction:

gun in the first act, the pinch of a nipple (unerect), guess we'd just have to stay away, unable to disincline, sun rising:

palm offered and outstretched, mindful, an awful jazz rendition of I Say a Little Prayer for You, the diver poised having sprung from
the board--make the best dive possible at this point:

considering the leftovers, other occasions, decades, but I made a lasange, compared with other lovemaking:

recognition of the voice before what it's saying:

prisoner's mug of the sea--an anchor and chains, glaze that won't hold water:

open-casket--the approach, a UTI scenario and honeymoon syndrome, nothing could stop, an exhibit of stacked rocks, journeys and
sacred spots, in anger wanting to nudge them all down, unobserved:

shoe in mid-air

the difficulty of finishing the wood, merlot in vials and routine, the canoe story, look it's the same event

talking to fill up the airholes, slip & miscalculation

ache before apology

a first breakage of trust::

expectation: appraisal::

Dana Lomax currently teaches writing at San Francisco State University,
works in bilingual classes with California Poets in the Schools, and is an
artist-in-residence for the Cities of Belmont and San Carlos through
Kollage Community School for the Arts. Her work has appeared in Inscape,
Coracle, Tripwire, yefief, Outlet, Transfer 76, Fourteen Hills, the S.F.
Bay Guardian among other publications. Her manuscript Room & won the San
Francisco Foundation's 1998 Joseph Henry Jackson Award and poems in it were
awarded Academy of American Poets, Ann Fields, and Mark Linnenthal Poetry
Prizes. She received a 1999 Peninsula Community Foundation Grant for an
upcoming manuscript entitled Currency and her chapbook Room was just
released by a+bend press in San Francisco. She is interested in community
and bridging communities.

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