Amanda Maret Scharf & Hannah Smith
Amber Vase
You came to me holding closeness
at a distance. Glass flumes,
the neck of a heron. Most days,
I can’t differentiate between two birds. I didn’t
ask. I wanted the question held in your mouth. Last month,
I counted spots below the leaves to keep track.
Closing the door on who I once was,
I was thoroughly disappointed by everything
but your glow. I started a holiday, just to take
a day off. An old, bitter winter, still stored
in the closet. Feed me something to remember
through the pane of glass. Illuminate the shape
of my empty hands. Return
color to my throat.
Amanda Maret Scharf is a poet from Los Angeles. Her poems have been published in Pleiades, Poetry Northwest, The Iowa Review, and elsewhere. She is the co-founder of publishing initiative and artist collaboration, mixedgreens. During her MFA at Ohio State, she served as Poetry Editor for The Journal.
Hannah Smith is a writer from Dallas, Texas. She received an MFA in poetry at the Ohio State University, where she served as the Managing Editor of The Journal. Her poems have been published or are forthcoming in Best New Poets, Gulf Coast, Ninth Letter, and elsewhere.
10.1