Fire Lyric, By Cynthia Zarin
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Three flames
on a branched
candlestick
One is Wick,
another
Tender,
the third
Pitch. Pitch
is gone.
Wick and
Tender are
two steamship
vents. Then
each in Alice
blue, two
can-can
dancers.
Then ghosts.
Tender’s
out. Gold but
with a heart
of ash, Wick’s
an owl on
a matchstick.
Feathers
singe in that
harsh hiss.
Topaz flares
two times
in the pier
glass--third eye
to find her
sisters there.
From “Fire Lyric” by Cynthia Zarin. (Knopf: $19.) 1993 Reprinted by permission. Zarin lives in New York City, where she is a staff writer at the New Yorker.
