To live between borders

Oscillating needle prick

   Constant shuttle to

Back       Forward       Center

the      bridge      seems      long

yet

thereisnoseparationofideas

Compartmentalize

Grief hides under left armpit

Fear likes the sock drawer

“hang joy here”

We are unwhole

S   e   p   a   r   a   t   e

absorbing every speck and grit

yet none

We belong to every/thing

and no/thing at once

We rely on this

for an opening

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–Melissa Eleftherion was born & raised in Brooklyn. A high school dropout, she went on to earn an MFA in Poetry from Mills College and an MLIS from San Jose State University. She is the author of huminsect, prism maps, Pigtail Duty, the leaves the leaves, green glass asterisms, and several other chapbooks. Her first full-length collection, field guide to autobiography, is forthcoming from H_NGM_N. Founder of the Poetry Center Chapbook Exchange, Melissa lives in Mendocino County where she works as a Teen Librarian, teaches creative writing, & curates the LOBA Reading Series at the Ukiah Library. More of her work can be found @ http://www.apoetlibrarian.wordpress.com.