Kim Bridgford

ALL THAT GLITTERS IS NOT GOLD

Sleep with an idol. Here's what happens then: There's glitter on your face, and hair, and mouth. You like it, make the coffee as you glisten. At first the glitter covers up the human: A drinking problem. Cigarettes. False teeth. Sleep with an idol. Here's what happens then: One day you find his failure on your skin. It's wet like paint, transparent as a moth. You hate it, make the coffee as you glisten. What happened to the glamour of the pen? What happened to the voice? It wasn't truth. Sleep with an idol. Here's what happens then. You know he doesn't want to be alone, That words mean nothing to him next to youth. You hate it, make the coffee as you glisten. You call your first an adolescent passion; You keep your next one shiny with a cloth. Sleep with an idol. Here's what happens then: You like it, make the coffee as you glisten. Kim Bridgford directs the writing program at Fairfield University, where she is a professor of English and poetry editor of Dogwood. Her poetry has appeared in The North American Review, The Christian Science Monitor, The Georgia Review, her fiction in Redbook, The Massachusetts Review and Witness. Bridgford received a 1999-2000 NEA Fellowship.

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