Chronic
You might be called
the twisted blade, a grating
noise, the withdrawn lift.
I can’t inhale without
feeling this. It has become
a being to me, the child-
less woman who still
manages cries. A skeleton
key, the get out of jail
free card—never used.
What would happen if I
could do anything?
Without the tightened reach,
weeping seams, I might see
only sky. At fixed sights,
perhaps I’m just light
in ascent, yielding to goodbye.
*
Sandra Marchetti is the author of three full-length books of poetry, DIORAMA (Stephen F. Austin State UP, 2025); Aisle 228 (SFA UP, 2023); and Confluence (Sundress Publications, 2015) as well as four chapbooks of poetry and lyric essays. Her poetry appears in Ecotone, Poet Lore, Blackbird, Southwest Review, Subtropics, and elsewhere. Essays and stories can be found in AWP’s The Writer’s Chronicle, Pleiades, Mid-American Review, Barrelhouse, The Account, and other venues. She is Poetry Editor Emerita for River Styx Magazine. She identifies as a poet of chronic pain and disability.
