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Issue 10: | October 2021 |
Poem: | 125 words |
I gave you away to Reminiscence, my favorite store in SoHo, long out-of-business. Now, I see you in a new second-hand shop, half-hidden under a pile of other rhinestone purses. “Hello, old friend.” Remember how we’d bounce from kiss to caress at Studio 54? I’d wear those bright purple, elephant-bell hip huggers. They always did the trick: By 4 AM, you’d be stuffed with numbers. I still wear bright colors. I see your once- flaming-fuchsia suede has worn to barely pink. Both of us are scored with lines, but hold spirit enough. I take you in my arms, unclasp you. Oh, strumpet! Inside, your glory’s unfaded and ripe! Unfolded, I too still flush, awakening the rose.
Publisher’s Note:
Learn more about the Reminiscence store in a blog entry by Jeremiah Moss
(10 January 2013) at Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York (aka The Book
of Lamentations: A Bitterly Nostalgic Look at a City in the Process of Going Extinct):
http://vanishingnewyork.blogspot.com/2013/01/reminiscence.html
Before falling for poetry, Madeline Artenberg was a press-pass-carrying photojournalist and street-theatre performer. She has been co-producing the Alternative New Year’s Day Poetry Extravaganza in New York City since 2002.
Her work has been published in, among others: Rattle, Mudfish, theravensperch, The POET, Caprice, Literature Today International Journal, Absinthe Literary Review, Skidrow Penthouse, Pudding House, Salonika, Vernacular, and Ducts.
Her awards and prizes include:
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