Barbara Costas-Biggs
Barbara Costas-Biggs lives and writes in Appalachian Southern Ohio. Her poems have been published recently or are forthcoming from Mothers Always Write, Northern Appalachia Review, Lost Balloon, Glass, 8Poems, Literary Mama, Ghost City Review, and others.
LET’S SAY
A beach ball bouncing down the road
in the December wind. The clouds, round,
mammatus. White caps on the river.
These grey days, these short days, I drive
to work in the dark and back home in the dark.
On winter days like this, I miss Tucson. Not the
ex-lover I met there and then ran back east
to forget. I miss the bike, a Peugeot that I loved.
I’d ride to Time Market from my little place at
7th and Euclid for Marlboros. I miss Catalina
Park. Late night drunken burritos from Los Betos.
Sunsets that stretch the entire sky. In Tucson,
the time never changes. No fall back, spring forward.
My husband said to me yesterday that we
only have now. That I live in the past, always
wishing to change unchangeable things. So I change
them here, in this poem. Let’s say I went home
with Tyson, not the ex-lover. When Paul crashed
his Vespa in front of my place, I didn’t bake
him a loaf of bread. I let Carolyn kiss me and I kept
the dogs. In Tucson, the time never changes.
I am still 18, 19, 20, bad hair and bad decisions.
On winter days, it makes sense to miss the sun.
Sheila-Na-Gig online 