Nudge
Amy Winehouse’s mother used to call her
a nudge, I read in People magazine.
Hello dear, she’d say into the mall air
piping Rehab on holiday shuffle
after Amy died, the voice
a steady fuck you, love me
over shoppers seeking gifts
mid perfume spurt, hanger rasp,
mini meanness of mirrors.
Nudge, Yiddish for boundary breaker,
something I call my young son.
Head-butter, rooter, baby
of mine. When you crack the seal
and slip my hold, draw in your angers—
when you reach your late twenties—
I pray you will sing your song to me
late at night on the phone,
not back through the black.
*
Jennifer Hyde Dracos-Tice (she/her) has poems published or forthcoming in Witness, Psaltery & Lyre, Crab Orchard Review, Whale Road Review, Rogue Agent, Still: The Journal (2016 Judge’s Award), Literary Mama, and elsewhere. A long-time high school teacher with literature degrees from Brown and Indiana-Bloomington, she lives with her wife in Florida.
From The Archives: Published on This Day
- Three Poems by Shelly Holder (2022)
- Five Poems by Laura Foley (2021)
