ENTER A SUBMISSION TO PLUME

Sally Bliumis-Dunn

Plume
Berlin
Berlin
September 26, 2016 Bliumis-Dunn Sally

Berlin

 

We see the public statues

 

water-stained and darker now.

 

Small bullet scars on buildings—

 

 

how can it be so quiet?

 

Though I keep almost hearing

 

someone close behind me,

 

 

the not quite footsteps,

 

voices traveling toward me,

 

and I am in a dog’s world

 

 

without the dog’s keen hearing.

 

I have only my sad psyche

 

where rounded cobblestones

 

 

appear like tops of shaven heads

 

and underneath,

 

the rest of their clothed bodies,

 

 

cramped into a crowd

 

mercilessly, still standing.

Sally Bliumis-Dunn teaches at the 92nd Street Y and offers writing consultations. Her poems have appeared in the New York Times, Paris Review, PBS NewsHour, Plume, Poetry London, Prairie Schooner, RATTLE, the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-day and Ted Kooser’s “American Life in Poetry. In 2002, she was a finalist for the Nimrod/Hardman Pablo Neruda Prize. Her third book, Echolocation, was published by Plume Editions/MadHat Press in March of 2018 and was shortlisted for the Eric Hoffer Award, a longlist finalist for the Julie Suk Award and Runner Up for the Poetry By the Sea Best Book Award.

Plume: Issue #63 October 2016

By the same author

Elegy
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The breeze this morning pulls on the surface of the bay
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