19 November 2007 | Vol. 7, No. 3
from The Diaphragm Knows One Motion Only
In this episode of angels, a mortal couple strolls, hand in hand, down a hall, around a corner on a cruise ship when a door shuts, a gas leaks, and a frantic couple is sealed in a tunnel, in a vessel, on the high seas they thought they could weather with each other, but a man breaks apart from a pair, looks like he should be on a stage somewhere attempting to come to terms with loss through some incessant sweet song sung low and long and a woman screams, bringing it all back to her ugly lips where a song becomes a siren embodied by the not long for life, a siren heard only by another and another holds her there as she bends back and creeps seaward in lifelessness, in the dire arms of a man, in the soft curves through which he extends himself to her, reaching and rounding, a woman descends.
About the author:
Jane Ashley is an MFA student at the University of Iowa where she is currently working on a collection of essays called "the book of concealed hearts." She is also a Writer-in-Residence at the UI Museum of Art. Her work is forthcoming from Ninth Letter and Gulf Coast.
For further reading:
See the complete list of work by Jane Ashley at 42opus. Browse the contents of 42opus Vol. 7, No. 3, where "from The Diaphragm Knows One Motion Only" ran on November 19, 2007. List other work with these same labels: poetry, prose poem.
