SUSANNA LAMEY

Eurydice and Orpheus

Say he had not doubted. Say
they both emerge whole
from the wolf’s mouth of the underworld,

unbelieving, fair-haired again. They return together
to their small apartment in downtown Thessaly.
The three-headed dog, the lust

of the shepherd – they put all that
behind them. Sometimes
she feels an awful thirst, sees peaches

hanging in the air before her.
She doesn’t mention it, or how his love songs
seem to waver like rural radio –

maybe it’s her ear fading in and out.
But he sees the leaf shadows
that dance on her face – no tree,

no sun. The day arrives
when he won’t buy pomegranates,
though she’d kill for one. In bed,

his teeth grow long
and sharp, his sighs the rattle
of fallen lungs. She dreams

of a charcoal river in a place so dark
she can’t see the far bank.
The pipe-breath of the ferryman

on her neck. When she wakes,
he’s clutching her in handfuls
of fish-white belly, thigh, terrified.






Susanna Lamey is a Pennsylvania native who received a dual MA in Poetry and Graphic Design from Boston University, with additional study at Susquehanna University and Ohio State. Susanna's poetry has appeared in Puerto del Sol and The Mid-American Review, and she is an AWP Intro Awards winner. Designer by day, poet by night, she currently lives in Boston, MA. Find her online at www.susannalameydesign.com (withabanjo@gmail.com)



Boxcar Poetry Review - ISSN 1931-1761