For two years now I’ve bristled
with memories of you. I pull them
from their lair, fur sleek, nails sharp.
They scrape me, lodge in the back
of my throat. Tilt of chainsaw
against log. BMW riding 132 to Percé.
Last days with oxygen, neck gouged,
cheeks pale. I am the keeper now,
the one who holds the language of
what once was. Your hands on dowsing
rods. Arm licking the air as you played
trombone. Stem of pipe between teeth.
I’ve discovered this weighs more than
stones, more than our last hug—a gesture,
a bridge I struggled across. Last
night a full moon silvered snow-
tiled trees. I thought: beautiful.
What else is there? How can I swab
the wound of all you miss? Your body
ashes. Once you touched me, fingers
satin on my back. That day at Calendar
Street. An animal nesting in my gut.
Judy Kaber is the author of four chapbooks, most recently Renaissance Man (2025). Her poems have been in journals such as Pleiades, Poet Lore, Tar River, and Prairie Schooner. Her poem, “Sword Swallowing Lessons,” was featured on “The Slowdown.” Judy won the 2021 and 2023 Maine Poetry Contest. A Maine Literary Award winner, her book, Landscape With Rocks, Sky, Nails, is forthcoming from Fernwood Press in 2025. She is a past poet laureate of Belfast, Maine (2021-2023).
