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Three Poems


by Janice Krasselt Medin



Meeting of Minds

We have no secrets here in this room
of women as we drift, wine in hand,
from one cluster to another.
We long to dive into luxurious caves
and feel soft arms around us.  Who
could not understand that need?

Most of us had a mother who wanted
another kind of daughter—one who
had crushes on boys, giggled over
names like Josh or John, not Rachel
or Sarah.  Some remained mystified
as their daughters stayed a tomboy,
always with boys around, never as dates,
but as best friends to shoot pool or rifles,
or talk about sports.  Other girls married
men, later left that nest and finally
admitted out loud their love of women—
those full lips, curves, soft breasts,
hips—even the swagger.

We like to talk about sex, our first time,
how we prefer to make love to a body
made like ourselves, how we come
stronger and stronger with a woman,
and how good it is to taste the female
of ourselves.

Do Not Resuscitate

The monitor showed 3rd degree block--
a heart rhythm where the atria, the top part
of the heart, beats separately
from the ventricles, the bottom,
like random thoughts,
one thought connecting to another,
the next two or three
escaping the common thread.
The patient was 60 years old,
not a young 60
with kidney and liver disease, 
a pacemaker buried inside her chest
like a sunken vessel at sea.  Its engine
refused to spark a beat of the ventricle.
We knew she was dying,
her blood pressure like air in a tire
leaking lower and lower, and lungs filling
with fluid.  When her heart slowed
to 40 beats a minute, her eyes grew wide.
We couldn’t believe her brain received
enough blood to feed her words
Is this the time to pray?”
We answered in unison, “Yes.”

Waking

I marvel how during sleep
we tangle together like a tight braid,
a lovers’ knot they call it.  Even
when we turn, we always hold on
to each other so we are one.
When we wake at 3 am and talk
as if the night belonged solely to us,
we try to forget in four hours ,
we will be swept away from each other.
Your hands touch my breasts, my thighs,
and every time I touch you in return,
the wonder of our first time blossoms
once again, a light both of us
had never seen before.  As we
celebrate that first night, we know
the memories of our touches
will return us to the shelter we have made.



Janice Krasselt Medin has an M.A. in English with Emphasis in Creative Writing from Ohio University.  My publications include two books of poetry published under the name Janice Tatter: Remembering the Truth (Temenos Publishing Company, 2006) and Communion of Voices (Big Table Publishing Company, 2009), a chapbook.  She is now publishing under her married name Janice Krasselt Medin; poems under that name have appeared in several journals such as the Yale Journal of Humanities in Medicine, Word Riot, Honey Land Review, Ghoti Magazine, and others.

Copyright 2010, Janice Krasselt Medin. © This work is protected under the U.S. copyright laws. It may not be reproduced, reprinted, reused, or altered without the expressed written permission of the author.