I mother the sad thought

of what became, wrap its body
in a light-green blanket, Plath’s
oven its bed. I watch her wedge
her towels between door and floor,
my windows and ledge. My mother
in the haze of a 1950s childbirth,
my waiting-room father’s pink-ribbon
cigars passed around like pamphlets.
It quelled my voice, body fisted,
cartoon stars circled my head.
It cannot sing for anyone.

Theresa Senato Edwards has published two full-length poetry books, one, with painter Lori Schreiner, which won The Tacenda Literary Award for Best Book, and two chapbooks. In 2019, her first chapbook, The Music of Hands, was published in a revised second print edition by Seven CirclePress. Poems from her newest manuscript entitled “Fragments of Wing Bones” can be found in Stirring, Gargoyle, The Nervous Breakdown, Thrush, Diode, Rogue Agent, Mom Egg Review, Menacing Hedge, Moria, Harbor Review, Matter Press’ Journal of Compressed Creative Arts, here in dialogist, and forthcoming in 3Elements Review, SWWIM, and Whale Road Review. Edwards was nominated twice for a Pushcart Prize, received creative writing residencies from Drop Forge & Tool and Craigardan, and is a poetry editor for American Poetry Journal. Her website: theresasenatoedwards.wixsite.com/tsenatoedwards