"Indwelling"
Click
In the crazy guest who saws off the chair legs,
In the wind hissing beneath the door sweep,
A tribe of mice squeezing through pocket doors,
In the pants pockets where the evidence remains,
Those filaments of wool in the moth-eaten rug,
In the masquerade of motion that sets off the alarm,
The alarm that arrives via airwaves at dinnertime,
In the worm that opens e-mail, eats the address book,
The virus propagating on the unsuspecting screen,
In the cell that missed a loop of timing and purpose,
The unpaid tax surfacing like a submarine,
In the bloody stool and saliva, the mucus and membrane,
Slits of sunlight discoloring blue curtains,
In the broken gutter where ice dams pry up the roof,
A crack in the skylight where mold sifts down,
In the contractor hammering windmills on shingles,
The carpenter bees burrowing barracks into the attic,
Who Said It: Toronto Mayor Rob Ford or Simpsons Mayor Diamond Joe Quimby?
Is Wal-Mart in Trouble? Is Amazon to Blame?
Is Your State Bird a Stupid State Bird? What It Should Be Instead.
Teresa Cader is the author of Guests, The Paper Wasp, and History of Hurricanes (2009). She teaches poetry in the low-residency MFA program at Lesley University.
For Slate's poetry submission guidelines, click spacerhereyeshyperlinkPoetry SubmissionsSlate reads new poems from Oct. 1 to April 30. Manuscripts sent between May 1 and Sept. 30 will not be considered.To submit poems: Send, as a single attached document, up to three poems of no more than 50 lines each to editors@slatepoems.com. Use the poet's name for the subject line of the e-mail and for the title of the attachment. We prefer Word documents (.doc or .docx) to PDFs.Please include a brief, professional cover letter, including publication history, in the body of your email. Please limit submissions to one per poet per annual reading period. Simultaneous submissions are OK. Slate no longer accepts poetry submissions by mail. The email address editors@slatepoems.com is for poetry submissions only (or to notify editors of acceptance elsewhere of a poem under consideration at Slate). Other inquiries, etc., will not be addressed.10000false220061444537PMWednesdayJanJanuary161/4/2006 9:45:37 PM63271989937000000020061444537PMWednesdayJanJanuary161/4/2006 9:45:37 PM632719899370000000.Clickhere to visit Robert Pinsky's Favorite Poem Project site.