NANCY JASKO - POEMS

After spending 12+ years teaching middle and high school students, Nancy has moved on to assisting with the wrangling of a 20-person basement waterproofing sales team. Some of Nancy's poems have been published in print or on-line journals such as Bacopa, Califragile, and Sunflower Collective. What Nancy doesn't capture in words will often be photographed, sketched, or painted.

​Old woman’s boot

Where does love live?
Boxed up in steel, saved and stashed
buried in her sienna skin.  Love borne
of the empty, barren of touch.

She seeds vacant eyes, we see them
search and yearn, sour with hurt
turn to the dirt of the earth
ploughed and underfed, sown in mocha.
Warm soft shit shod from life.

Scythe and sheathe, sigh and heave apple pie
shine once jarred, in bottleneck reeds. 
Copper vomit mudslide (sealed lust spewed).

Beetles race on clay, scuttle away beneath 
clods of rootless grass. She plods past rusted 
gates, rifle cocked in wait, in cold knuckle grip.

Daylight dims on broken falcon wings.
Burnt turkey basted. Muffins crusted for thrift
camp in brown paper bags, shelved for safety.

Callow dog on leathered leash retreats
in leaves by wooden fences. Blood-clodden boar
muddied swine in briny puddle. Pine needles fallen
sodden in tar, stuck to heels.

Old woman's boot
her only crime.

​

fate’s disgrace
​

wrapped around a tree
little girl, little girl
shake her mommy
cry out
scream
locked in car
mommy nods
huffin’ dusters
dismal state
little baby, little baby
strapped in seat
silenced cry
closed eyes
boxed in car
coffin date
mommy grogs
huffin’ dusters

​