Untitled Document

Three Women
Ivy Alvarez

words exchanged like coins
jangle in my mouth, a purse
carried between you and her
a cent short here and there
for a bit lip or a tear

something ordinary—
too familiar or ill
to hear each other.
the phone rings.
no-one answers

I slip down the line,
quiet, a whisper
or held breath

hollow as a dial tone
howls into silence
useless as notes
from an unstrung violin
empty as a pictureless frame

you carry it into the room.
love is a picture
like the skin of your lids
worn to paper
from the effort of not crying

Ivy Alvarez's book, Mortal , is forthcoming from Red Morning Press (US) in 2006. Her poetry appears in journals and anthologies in Australia , Canada , England , the Philippines , Republic of Ireland , Scotland , USA , Wales , and online. 'Three women' was translated and published in Russian online journal REZ in 2005. Issue 27: