Bart Edelman
Darcy
Had a way with words.
Befriended each syllable twice.
Once was not nearly enough
For her to take them home,
Select a drawer in the desk,
Where she kept them all—
Under gold lock and silver key.
Of her days, little is known,
Even less regarding nights.
She practiced secrecy and silence,
Worshipped letters, like lovers,
Demanding nothing in return.
Convinced a complicit moon
To give her one more dawn.
Bart Edelman’s poetry collections include Crossing the Hackensack (Prometheus Press), Under Damaris’ Dress (Lightning Publications), The Alphabet of Love (Red Hen Press), The Gentle Man (Red Hen Press), The Last Mojito (Red Hen Press), The Geographer’s Wife (Red Hen Press), Whistling to Trick the Wind (Meadowlark Press), and This Body Is Never at Rest: New and Selected Poems 1993 – 2023 (Meadowlark Press). He has taught at Glendale College, where he edited Eclipse, a literary journal, and, most recently, in the MFA program at Antioch University, Los Angeles. His work has been widely anthologized in textbooks published by City Lights Books, Etruscan Press, Fountainhead Press, Harcourt Brace, Longman, McGraw-Hill, Prentice Hall, Simon & Schuster, Thomson/Heinle, the University of Iowa Press, Wadsworth, and others. He lives in Pasadena, California.