Luck

Marilyn Annucci

Marilyn Annucci’s poems are wryly playful and utterly serious. As she contemplates the threat of serious illness, the poignancy of aging parents, and the elusiveness of life’s purpose, Annucci finds comic relief and perspective in humble household objects — the contents of a kitchen drawer, dental floss, or a stick of butter. These wonderfully imaginative poems speak of yearning, protest, and joy. Her poems have appeared in various publications, including Southern Poetry Review, The Journal, andPoet Lore. Annucci was awarded second prize by the 2003 Summer Literary Seminars in St. Petersburg, Russia, for her work Cosmography. She lives in Madison and teaches in the Department of Languages and Literatures at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater.

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Excerpt

Missing

My sister, the blonde ghost
peers out at me from strange cars —
her blue eyes
sharp as a surgeon’s
before the gash.
And then she’s gone.

I told my father, Be kinder
I told my mother, Let her know you love her
I told myself, Don’t lose track

She’s too old for the sides of milk cartons
so I’ll tell you:

She was last seen in Vermont,
a woman in a pale green dress;
something about it seemed Victorian —
the collar?
the buttons?
Might have been her cheekbones:
Meryl Streep with Botticelli hair.
People used to stop her on the street
Are you an
angel?

I wonder if she misses me
misses us
her dull kin.
She used to wrap our Christmas gifts in felt.
I wonder what she tells when people ask —
My family? Oh.
I was the only one
to survive the crash.