Margaret Saraco

Margaret R. Sáraco writes about love, family, politics, and nature. Her debut poetry collection, If There Is No Wind (Human Error Publishing, 2022) has been widely acclaimed. Her second collection, Even the Dog Was Quiet, will be published in 2023. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and twice won Honorable Mention for poems in the Allen Ginsberg contest. Her poetry and short stories appear in numerous anthologies and journals. Margaret loves learning, exploring, and sharing. 

Freshly Picked Blueberries

You call it midnight

but it is only afternoon.

In bed shadowed by

dark curtains, you can’t tell.

Your breath brushes

blueberries in a bowl

as you marvel at the little miracles

then hand them back uneaten.

One day as darkness

cascades across the land,

stillness drifts through you,

stopping your heart

gently or roughly, I don’t know

yet the cathedral bells chime

twelve times, to mark

your midnight passing.

Secrets

With clothes and pretenses gone,

the boy in the window near the skylight

outside the lofted art studio

is asked to leave every time I pose.

My poor father would have been mortified.

His daughter, a college graduate

moving about the country from one state to another

“without a pot to piss in,” my mother would say.

I dare not tell her either.

My father died and I am too proud

to ask my mother for money she doesn’t have

If I model, I eat and pay rent.

If I don’t, I live in my car or go home.

I am comfortable around artists

young or old, women or men,

pigment aromas

pencils scratching paper

brushes on canvas

charcoal smudges on skin.

I take the job

The instructor directs quick

2-and 3-minute warm-ups

not too difficult, then 20-minutes and longer

a deep breath, still my body, train my mind

No matter how unflattering

or physically graphic the positions.

I go elsewhere

to my father’s wake and burial

my mother’s sorrow when I pull out of the driveway

telling her, “I don’t know when I will be back,”

to drinking with roommates,

song lyrics and Shakespearean sonnets

to a quiet place, willing leg cramps,

coughs and deep breaths away.

Time’s up, the teacher says.

I shiver

someone hands me my robe.

It makes me laugh

when I look at their art

and someone just

draws my hand or my foot

all that exposure for nothing.

Somewhere there are images of me

caught on canvas, fully displayed.

After the break, I pose again,

the boy who finished stretching

takes his position outside the window.

I can’t speak, because I can’t move.

I watch him as he watches me

bared and vulnerable.