Nicole Callihan

NEAR DUSK:


a man places
a seaport
at my windowsill

and I watch
the water
hold up the boats,

count the one
eyed fish.
These are

the words
I do not say:
loss, candle,

begin, but
it is near
night and

Dusk leaves
me only
to my mouths,

my pillow,
my own
two hands

making birds
of the shadow
on the wall.

Nicole Callihan's poems, stories and essays have appeared or are forthcoming in Painted Bride Quarterly, Salt Hill, inDigest, Cream City Review and La Petite Zine. She was a finalist for the Iowa Review's Award for Literary Nonfiction and was named as Notable Reading for 2004 Best American Non-required Reading. IShe lives in Brooklyn with her husband and daughter and teaches at New York University, as well as, in schools and hospitals throughout New York City.