Somerville poet Tam Lin Neville has a new book out from Somerville’s Cervena Barva Press  “Triage.” Here is a poem from this fine collection.
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Visiting Celia in the Psych Ward

The one-way ticket to Paris

is in the trash, your credit card’s

torn in two, the Mercedes repossessed.

The shooting rocket of bliss

burst and fell to earth, leaving you here

in this locked ward among addicts

and those who can’t sleep, by day or night.

Your grey eyes sweep the room

you’ve returned to after a month away.

As we speak, your hand is at your lip,

fingering an invisible cigarette.

Lithium keeps you steady

under the blanket you wear all day,

a hood over your head.

At lunch you sit beside the woman

who eats everyone’s ice cream

and the man whose glass eye has turned inward.

Embarrassed for him, you say nothing.

His white eye stares into the mess

she’s made of hospital food.

That’s the way the light enters,

one inch at a time.  In the long afternoon

you sit like a cat in the window’s sun,

nails split and mottled.  You’ve picked off

most of the polish, something to do

before you shoot back up into the blue.

– Tam Lin Neville

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