Margaret Roncone

I Fall in Love with a Photo of e.e. cummings in a New Yorker Magazine While in the Waiting Room of an Opthamologist’s Office

it's black and white

he's looking intently

away from the camera at

a parade of lower case 'i’s

a hyphened world

linear time and rhyme

disappear in a desert

of white stallions

my eyesballoon

at handsome

i need to nestle in his 

supra sternal notch

feel his swallows

as they gather

on telephone wires

stretched

from limb

to beautiful

limb.

     Margaret Roncone


I carry my father's face above my shoulders floating like a raft. A piece of antler tears the sky as an old woman slowly walks a bereft dog. I watch her, one eye closed to the sea of memory and mansions. Maybe in my craving for sustenance I strangely resemble someone else. The reflection in the mirror is a different child whose sunhat sits akimbo. See how lips work without speaking. It is a star’s desire to nest in the cradle of heaven.

     Margaret Roncone


Miles at Sea

the lighthouse is a blink in the 

eye of the great white 

years ago I had you 

tied to a floating dock

I wet my eyes daily

with salt water

tears not for you

but for thousands who would

never know your lazy walk

your hands holding two worlds 

paths through woods

twisted our hearts 

eventually we disentangled 

frayed rope

sandy embankments 

no foothold. 

     Margaret Roncone