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This poem is taken from PN Review 235, Volume 43 Number 5, May - June 2017.

Two Poems John Muckle
In the Bright Room

Everybody comes in wearing a new hat
The one they originally wore, their name
Stitched around the hatband, a special
Nickname they were once known by
The one they took on arriving
Doing some characteristic thing, not
Subject to the deformations of memory

In the bright room you make entrance
Once and forever pinned, always apart
Turning on your heel, stalk off in a long stride
A long grey skirt you used to wear back then
Or perhaps you smile shyly, and I 
Pray over the open notebooks of light


These Stories

Hallucinating in a hall of mirrorsx
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