Selected Poems
By Janet Sternburg

These poems are from Optic Nerve: Photopoems (Red Hen Press), a new collection of the author's poetry.

A Life in Earrings 

1.
One foot slightly turned out 
the way a model stood
in Seventeen: 

my dad took a snapshot 
of me, standing in the driveway, 
pump-shod.

Even though the photograph 
is black and white, 
I know
my suit is dusty rose. 
A ribbon holds back my hair. 
My ears are bare. 

2. 
Allowed to wear 
tiny pearl earrings 
I bit 

into the apple 
and came to know
of clips, 

their pinch
at my lobes
still 

3. 
New to the city
I lived above a store 
whose owner 
let me buy
one egg at a time.
Across the street, a girl 
in long flowered skirts
made earrings of her own
design. I chose 
filigree, framing
a red glass bead. 
At the corner 
a store made its own
sausage, two 
steaming links 
handed over the counter
wrapped in butcher paper.
One for immediate eating,
the other holding back
its juices, for that egg. 

4.
I turned my head.
Red glass beads 
caught the light. 

At a loft downtown,
a man came up to say
When you read your work,
don't wear those earrings 
Nothing should distract from your words. 

5.
Silver discs 
reflective as moons,
a present for me.
He was a vice-president. 
His office was furnished
with wing chairs, and lamps
like ships' steering wheels. 
I was on another floor, 
my desk out in the corridor. 
Even after we were married
I used to walk 
into that office 
softly, almost on tiptoe 
onto his rug,
thick enough to lose
an earring in. 

6. 
At this, my first serious job,
the receptionist in her spare time
made earrings,
strong and glinting
as though found in the dirt 
of a ancient past.
I worried: too bold?

Older, I unearthed them, 
thrilled now to revel
in their barbaric heft. 



7.
After all this time
Shouldn't he 
know me better?
How could he ever 
have chosen these?

8.
I'd planned to meet him
at the appointed hour
dressed just so. 
A half hour before 
I was at the bathroom sink 
washing my face, wearing 
underwear and high heels, sure
I had enough time, when 
There's a knock on the door. 
"Who's there?" and it's him, 
my former husband. 

"You're early," I shout. (Ouch, 
did that sound wrong? What a way 
to begin.) "Give me a minute." 
I put on pants that tie in front, 
like a sarong. Except I've got them 
back to front. 
I look like a badly diapered baby. 
"Sorry to keep you waiting out there, 
but I wasn't dressed yet." (Will he think 
I'm being provocative? Or maybe, 
"Just like her, always late.") 
Damn! These pants narrow 
at the ankles. They catch 
the shoes, trapping them 
heel to toe. One shoe 
slides out easily; the other I can't dislodge. 
I bend over, rocking the shoe 
back and forth, 

"Hang on . . . 
I'll be right there . . . 
just a second." 

Got it.
I forego 
make-up, grab 
what I think is a pair, 
clip on two 
mismatched earrings, 
run to open 
the door. 


9.
I only have one. 
I keep thinking I'll open 
an old pocketbook 
and there will be its mate. 
I miss it.

Then again, 
I only have one breast, 
and it's adequate for living. 


10.
On the refrigerator door, 
a poodle-shaped magnet 
holds a postcard of a poodle.
In a drawer, I have a pair, 
yes I do, of poodle earrings. 
My dog has lived longer
than the average life span.
From here on, both of us
live in grace. 
When I offer
her a treat, how delicately 
she takes it. How sweet 
is her warm 
breath on my palm. 

11. 
In amethyst
glass globes 
bedecked, I am

Demeter
at harvest, 
abundant in plums.