interior landscapes

                           






                              by






                  Donna Pucciani














A month after surgery,  the speculum
illuminates a new terrain
of black sutures not yet absorbed,
a colony of strange insects.


Surely after the removal
 of organs shaped like bulbs,
breaking the soil in this warmest of winters,
one can expect a lining of smooth silk
left behind,  a luminous pink.


But no,  the healing is slow,
says the doctor,  caught in a web
of hesitation.   She goes deeper
into the empty plot of land
seeking tissue softened and cured,
bloodless, scabless,  but finds only stitches
like dark pistils among swollen blossom.






















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