"Seam" by Iva Moore
Iva Moore’s poem, “The Right Path” was featured in our Summer 2022 Illusions issue.
Like real images
from a real childhood,
even if I walk facing
backward, I hit it
with the clothes I wear.
When I asked you to take
it and you said OK,
I cried a lot.
I delight it against
a blanket and the brightest
critics leave. Reflex,
that hardened fold over
hardened benches.
It tries to talk to the universe.
Watery note in the mud.
In a lecture, Lish
said to avoid the word “then,”
because if something is written
next, of course it is then.
Though it all seems then.
My having it. And it you.
And the suffering I did,
its democracy. You told
me my complaining
could be done in a more productive
manner. Who said doves?
I said doves.
Now I’m cured.
Iva Moore is a poet from Waverly, Kentucky. Her writing has been featured in Juked, Hobart, The Quarterless Review, and elsewhere. Her forthcoming chapbook Women Collapse Into / Better, Brighter Artists was selected by Sawako Nakayasu as the winner of the Oversound Chapbook Prize.
