Plateau
Gaia and Zeus sit on the black leather couch
in her living room. They are drinking mint tea.
He has put aside his feathers.
Her slender feet are in his lap.
He cradles the heel of one foot
in his hand and presses on the sole
of her arch with his thumbs. It hurts
and it comforts.
It’s taken a while to get here,
one damn role play after another.
It’s been decades
since they’ve had a night to play.
Zeus explains that, once again,
he has to go home to his wife.
Gaia has to get up in a minute
and keep the planet going.
Isn’t that always the way?
Children, a loaf of bread rising,
the work of every day. You and I are grains
preserved in a 3,000 year old vase, Gaia says,
the contours of the future an ink blot
shaping lovers into lozenges of heat.
They stare at the sky, haunted by its replay
of sunrise, until Zeus shrugs on his wings
and flies away.
in her living room. They are drinking mint tea.
He has put aside his feathers.
Her slender feet are in his lap.
He cradles the heel of one foot
in his hand and presses on the sole
of her arch with his thumbs. It hurts
and it comforts.
It’s taken a while to get here,
one damn role play after another.
It’s been decades
since they’ve had a night to play.
Zeus explains that, once again,
he has to go home to his wife.
Gaia has to get up in a minute
and keep the planet going.
Isn’t that always the way?
Children, a loaf of bread rising,
the work of every day. You and I are grains
preserved in a 3,000 year old vase, Gaia says,
the contours of the future an ink blot
shaping lovers into lozenges of heat.
They stare at the sky, haunted by its replay
of sunrise, until Zeus shrugs on his wings
and flies away.
Jan / Feb 2024
Pamela Annas grew up in the Navy, lived for two years in a village in Turkey and graduated from high school in Yokohama, Japan. She is Professor Emerita of English at University of Massachusetts/Boston where she offered courses in working-class literature, modern and contemporary poetry, science fiction, and personal narrative writing, is a member of the editorial collective and poetry editor at Radical Teacher and has published books and articles on poetry and pedagogy and poems in various journals and anthologies. Her chapbook Mud Season was published by Cervena Barva Press. A number of her poems are currently the script for a modern dance performance, Origami Night, in Portland, Oregon.
Art: Donna Morello, Collage