Gianna Russo
Locket & Altar
The moon is waxing or waning—
whatever.
It’s been seven years,
the bare kitchen table set to remember.
She’s in the dog star,
she’s with the great bear.
Some nights she’s waiting behind a door.
She’s a girl with a thirties smile.
She’s phlox in a crystal vase.
The prayer candle, Mother and Child,
silver forks, Thanksgiving plates.
She’s the wrist watch with its black bonnet.
A filigree of ashes
sealed in my locket.
Gianna Russo is the inaugural Wordsmith of The City of Tampa. She is the author of All I See is Your Glinting: 90 Days in the Pandemic; One House Down; and Moonflower, winner of a Florida Book Award. She’s published poems in Green Mountains Review, Gulf Stream, The Sun, Poet Lore, Florida Review, Karamu, and Calyx, among others. She is Associate Professor of English and Creative Writing at Saint Leo University, a mother and grandmother.