Lea Graham
2021 Michelle Boisseau Poetry Prize Winning Poem
In A Polish Dream
I am sleeping & driving
from the back seat
through night & snow.
Waking, still in the dream,
I realize & reach for the wheel.
Something isn’t right about my life.
I am excited
driving this dark away
from the past into
other pasts.
Years later & one morning,
our Polish neighbors across the way
have given us pork & bread
spread with lard for breakfast.
The night before, you sang
“Happy Birthday” with a woman
named Beata, drank vodka
& wine in a rectangle of light,
raised our glasses
with these unknown,
familiar people
here on the Adriatic coast,
near Dante’s grave.
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Lea Graham is the author of two poetry collections, From the Hotel Vernon (Salmon Press, 2019) and Hough & Helix & Where & Here & You, You, You (No Tell Books, 2011); a fine press book, Murmurations (Hot Tomato Press, 2020), and three chapbooks, Spell to Spell (above/ground Press, 2018), This End of the World: Notes to Robert Kroetsch (Apt. 9 Press, 2016) and Calendar Girls (above/ground Press, 2006). She is the editor of the anthology of critical essays: From the Word to the Place: The Work of Michael Anania (MadHat Press, 2022). She is an associate professor of English at Marist College in Poughkeepsie, NY, and a native of Northwest Arkansas.
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