Lisa Abraham and Denise Lichtig

Monday March 14, 2016 at 7:30 PM

SPC at 1719 25th Street

Host: Emmanuel Sigauke

Lisa Dominguez Abraham’s poems have appeared in many journals, including The North American Review, Poetry East and Tule Review, and her chapbook Low Notes was published by Red Wing Press. She teaches at Cosumnes River College.

Gathering Breadcrumbs

 Not birds but a sculptor gathers

Hansel and Gretel’s dropped bread crumbs

and glues them into a tiny loaf of bread

strategically lit to glisten

as an art installation. He’s built, too

a drum kit from the towel-wrapped water jug

a teenager dropped as she made her way north

through dust and scorpions.

Art aficionados walk around the kit,

study an unknown girl’s despair

sensing she makes it from Sinaloa

where teenagers wield guns

all the way to the candied land where she

sorts grapes for artists who make wine.

It’s unclear which side of the border

is home or oven, unknowable

as she stands beside other masked women,

quick hands working to send

whatever she can gather

from a thin paycheck south.

 

Denise Lichtig has published previously, in Hayden’s Ferry Review, The Suisun Review, The Antioch Review, Dry Heat, Cider Press Review and was a semi-finalist in the Discovery/Nation Award, and a Pushcart Small Press Nominee, as well as a finalist for the Atlanta Review International Poetry 2012 Contest.  “Crystal Gods” was a winner in the Quinton Duval chapbook contest.  She practices Chinese Medicine and Acupuncture in Davis, California and owns a small Tai Chi Chuan school.