Today Writing In A Woman's Voice celebrates its 500^th post of poems and stories told in a woman's voice with:

A life in process

by Lynne Zotalis

Still so much fragility in me,

hidden by bravado.

The tears pour over a welling

of my lower lid

to cheeks

that anticipate anointing.

I lick my lip and it’s salty,

and I miss the taste of my sweet love.

Sitting on this faded plum, nylon chair

you bought,

I don’t remember where or when,

but you scoured the back roads along the Mississippi

before you discovered it,

paying twenty dollars.

Better than that was the wrong turn onto gravel,

“I found this clearing enclosed by walnuts and red oak,” you’d tell me,

knowing I’d fix a picnic basket

and we’d spend a sun-bathed fall afternoon there

immersed

in the nature

of each other.

I can still close my eyes

and feel your soft breath

in my ear

six years after the ocean

called your name.

* * * * *

As a freelance contributor and member in the Iowa Poetry Association, Lynne Zotalis’s poetry has been published in Lyrical Iowa for ten years running. She is a member of the Peace and Social Justice Writers Group at the Loft in Minneapolis, MN, with contributions to their chapbook and Turning Points: Discovering Meaning and Passion in Turbulent Times. Her poetry has appeared in Tuck Magazine and Poetic Bond VII , and Lynne was one of six winners of the RH Cunningham short story contest published in the book Life Dances. All available on Amazon.