alteration
don’t look at my fingers
bluish purple twitching
i grow leaves from the bulbs
of my fingers sometimes
in the middle of a conversation
the terrible itching
comes the cracking
of skin the bitter
sap oozing through the crack
no wonder i’m losing my friends
those who stick around think I’m weird
though everything in the background blooms
they want to plant me in a pot
but haven’t found one large enough
for my constantly branching body
they should hurry i’m simmering
with sap
what a picture we make
my fragrant tendrils
sweeping across
their faces embracing
their dead
limbs
Spring Inspection
She lies on the couch, legs crossed,
eyes staring into the ceiling. A day comes
when she’ll have to do something: go out
and shuffle through the snow, fall
on the ground, stand up and run,
smell the bushes for a sign of spring
or dog urine, break twigs between her fingers.
She could watch squirrels chase
one another up and down some tree.
Or she could wait and see.
The ceiling is low today. Clouds drift
through the window, grackles pick daintily
the last berries from frozen vines.
She can forgive winter
for its long oddity, its tired body
of a shrunken old woman. Vines spring
through her couch. A day comes when she must
do something, or simply lie there and bloom.
Author Bio: Originally from Chisinau, Moldova, Romana Iorga lives in Switzerland. She is the author of two poetry collections in Romanian, Poem of Arrival and Simple Hearing. Her work in English has appeared or is forthcoming in The American Journal of Poetry, HCE Review, PANK, Eclectica Magazine, Saltfront, and others, as well as on her poetry blog at clayandbranches.com.
