Miriam Calleja

Miriam Calleja is the bilingual author of poetry collections Pomegranate Heart, Inside, Stranger Intimacy, the long poem Remember, and the collaboration Luftmeer.  Her work has appeared in Odyssey, Sentinel Quarterly, and Fly on the Wall Poetry. Her translated work has appeared in the performance Medinea, on Red Fern Review, and is forthcoming in Modern Poetry in Translation. She has read at Malta Mediterranean Literature Festival (Malta), Transpoesie (International), Schamrock Festival for Women Poets (Germany), Poetry on the Lake (Italy), and Wednesday Night Poets (U.S.).

Tiersen’s Nursery Rhyme 

When I met Tiersen I could trip
without breaking, although god knows
I left bones on those stairs.
And I wish I could bite my tongue,
it was a blind way down
from wine-stained lips to a clipping
of notes. 

After that day continuous tumbling
into bruised love songs
Those are the sweetest eyes… 

Forte, a slap across the wrist.
Forte, a smarting of the face,
a tightening on the neck. Fortissimo.

I digress, eat the waltz,
climb back up. 

Allegro. The to and fro-ing
Allegro. Placing me on a pedestal. Adagio.

Da capo. At each beginning,
a woman’s fingers tremble with a needle
at the record player.

Seethe

I fold your fingers
at the knuckle. They make unnatural sounds. 

It is a way to distract
a pianist long enough

he calls your bluff
as you dial.

It is hard to know what will happen
between now and then.
In these same rooms, you nuzzled me
as I passed out from the fall.
In these same rooms, you pinned me
to the sofa, framing my face in a kiss.
In these rooms you said
my lips were soft
and that I should stop meeting my friends. 

The police car has arrived.

Love in the mist

I used to keep it
in a jar, out of oxygen. 

I used to keep it
to myself, out of fear. 

I’ve hung it in spider threads,
worldwide webs, safety nets,
inspected in the knuckles
of my glass, the bottom
of your fists.

You sang love in the mist.
You sang never insist.

Put it back in the jar
and starve it.